As a hockey mom, I’m not mad at the U.S. men’s hockey team, I’m mad at the culture that allows misogyny to fester

As a former hockey mom who spent Mother’s Days, birthdays, anniversaries, and significant portions of holiday breaks from school watching and cheering for my daughter and her teammates on the ice, oftentimes with my laptop open whilst juggling the job that afforded her these opportunities, I feel like I have good standing to comment on the “locker room talk” video of our nation’s President implying women who won Olympic gold were somehow less deserving of celebration than the men who won the very same medal.

For those who may have missed it, President Donald Trump, after the U.S.A. men’s hockey team defeated the Canadians in overtime to win the gold medal, called FBI Director Kash Patel, who was partying with the team in the locker room, infamous beer chugging and all, and was placed on speakerphone to congratulate the team.

Excellent, well done, Mr. President.

Except it didn’t stop there. He proceeded to invite the team to his State of the Union address a couple of days later, even offering up a military flight that, somehow, was subject to inclement weather. If his comments had stopped there, no one would be talking about this exchange, but it didn’t stop there. He then reminded the men’s team that he’d also have to invite the women, and he said it in a tone that suggested it was an unfortunate requirement. Laughter from our U.S. boys then filled the locker room.

Outrage followed.

The moment struck me as the parent of a young woman who, for years, played ice hockey until an unfortunate injury prematurely ended her aspirations to, maybe, play in college. Until then, I watched over and over again as the boys’ teams were consistently prioritized — they got better ice time, greater investment, and more attention.

Our girls were treated as a novelty.

So I imagined those young women, who just achieved the unimaginable, on the biggest possible stage, hearing their President dismiss them as a sideshow. I imagined the frustration, the exasperation, the lack of any surprise at all, really. And I imagined their parents, who, I assure you, invested tens of thousands of dollars, probably much more, so that their daughters could hone their skills to play at the most elite levels of their chosen sport. I could feel their outrage at the disrespectful tone.

And sure, some people may think it was harmless enough. It was just a joke. And to be honest, it’s far from the most devaluing thing this President has said about women.

Hell, I’m not even all that mad at the players in the locker room who did not speak up to defend the women’s team in the face of mockery. After all, most of these men are barely men. Some are only just out of their teens. There’s a lot of life left for them to find the courage to stand up when it’s especially hard. And this was, let’s be honest, a difficult forum in which to stand up. It’s easy to say they SHOULD have pushed back, but it’s a lot harder to actually do that when it is the President of the United States of America on the phone, the most powerful man in the world.

So what really bothers me is that none of this was even a little surprising.

As women, we know all too well what it means to be taken less seriously, whether that’s in the workplace, on the field of battle, or, in this case, at an ice rink. At work, we are expected to perform as if we don’t have children, yet at home, we’re expected to parent as if we don’t work. Statistically speaking, women are the household managers, and their work at home far surpasses that of men, even when both work outside the home. In the military, women constantly face the threat of sexual assault, and when it’s reported, it’s too often ignored. In sports, women face major pay gaps even when their audiences have begun to rival that of men’s sports.

While talking points have evolved and some men have genuinely come around to accepting women as their equals, while even men who still harbor misogynistic feelings now suppress those feelings in public because it has become uncouth, none of these perceptions of women, none of the poor treatment of women, none of the blatant or even not-so-blatant disrespect will end until men demand better from other men, including the President.

To all of the men who got their panties in a bunch when women collectively said, “We choose the bear,” this is why.

We cannot trust men we don’t know. Sometimes we can’t trust men we do know.

Even if they say the *right* things, we don’t know what they say when we aren’t looking.

When we are successful, there are still too many who assume it’s because we slept our way to the top or were some sort of diversity hire.

We still get cat-called.

We still get mansplained to.

We still get unsolicited advice in the gym.

Like the Me Too movement, every woman has at least one story. I have more than there is time to mention.

I once spoke with a solar panel salesman who later used my cell phone number to solicit pictures of my feet. At another time, a man approached me on the street and tried to exploit my kindness, again with the feet, tricking me into letting him touch them. I’ve been told I’m too pretty for yard work. I’ve had men ask to speak to my husband about a home repair, even though I was the one who called them in the first place, all because they assume a woman couldn’t possibly be making decisions about a new roof. I could go on and on and on.

So when I heard most of those young men in that locker room laugh when the President downplayed the success women found on the ice, even though the medal is the exact same, it hit like a ton of bricks, with a familiarity all women know and most women despise.

To men who are still reading this, will you stand up and speak out even when it’s uncomfortable? Will you tell your “boys” that it’s not OK to objectify women? Will you tell them when a joke is in poor taste? Will you support us even when we’re not watching, when the cigars are lit, and the bourbon is flowing? If the answer is no, life will go on for us, but know this: We don’t think you’re a good guy just because you weren’t the one commenting. Your complacency in the tearing down of women speaks just as loudly as the remarks themselves.

Many of these silent men know better, yet they still fail. And that will not change until enough of them are willing to shame the shameful rather than dismiss it as harmless banter. Because while it may not harm you, it does harm us. It harms your wives, daughters, sisters, and mothers.

Sadly, I worry our societal expectation that men be given a pass on basic human decency is too entrenched for today’s men to make a meaningful difference. So it may become incumbent on the next generation of men, armed with fierce mothers and brave dads willing to demand better of them, to carry the torch of being an ally to women.

So to the moms and dads and caretakers who buy their boys kitchen sets and dolls, who teach them that chores don’t have gender; to those caretakers who teach their daughters to reach for the stars, even if they’re told it’s a “boy’s sport” or a “man’s job,” you are the change we need to see in this world.

In the meantime, don’t let the gaslighting of emotional abusers silence your disdain. Scream from whatever platform you can find that disrespect will not be tolerated. Not in a locker room. Not in a boardroom. Not at home. Not at school. Not on the street. Not anywhere.