I started going to the gym in September for a very simple reason: my life felt out of control. Too many things were piling up at once. Emotionally, mentally, socially and I realise I was reacting more than I was choosing. I didn’t suddenly decide fitness was my passion. I decided that if I couldn’t control everything, I could at least control my body and my weight
The gym became that space. A place where my effort was linear. You show up, you work out, you leave feeling stronger than you came in. Or at the very least, you tried.
What I didn’t anticipate was that the gym would also become a microcosm of everything I already knew about patriarchy but hoped, foolishly, I might escape for about 2 to 3 hours a day.
Since September, I’ve met different kinds of people in that space. Men and women. Young and older. And one thing many of them have in common is how deeply they’ve internalised sexism often without realising it, and worse, without questioning it.
I’ve been asked, casually and uninvited, “Are you a feminist?” as though it were a confession I needed to make. And when I answer yes, the follow-up is always suspicion. “Why?” As if wanting equal rights requires any justification whatsoever. As if feminism is something you stumble into after trauma, not a logical response to the reality that is the patriarchal system.
I’ve had real arguments with women in that same gym who are visibly unsettled by the fact that I have no interest in marriage, no anxiety about timelines, and absolutely no desire to have children. Not now. Possibly not ever. And definitely not because society insists that womanhood must culminate in childbirth.
There is something deeply offensive, apparently, about a woman who isn’t afraid of being alone, who doesn’t see marriage as a prize, and who doesn’t feel incomplete without a child. That discomfort often turns into projection. Judgment. Attempts to correct me.
Most days, I let it slide. You learn to conserve energy when you realise how expensive explaining yourself can be.
Today, I didn’t.
I was in the middle of my workout when a song started playing, one of those songs that sounds harmless if you don’t think too hard about it. The premise was simple: if women aren’t present, the party won’t be nice. No women, no fun. No women, no atmosphere.
And I felt my mood shift almost immediately.
Because on the surface, people will say it’s a compliment. That it’s meant to hype women up. But compliments that reduce women to accessories are not compliments.
The underlying message isn’t that women are valued as people, it’s that women are valuable for what they provide to others. Entertainment. Visual pleasure. And Validation.
In a system already designed to position women as secondary characters in their own lives, this kind of messaging doesn’t exist in a vacuum. It reinforces the idea that women are not meant to be, but to enhance. That our presence is only meaningful insofar as it improves someone else’s experience.
So I turned off the music.
I said plainly that if music was going to be played in a shared space, it shouldn’t be degrading or dehumanising, especially not in a gym where women are present, working on their bodies, pushing themselves, minding their business.
That’s when the conversation turned ugly.
Some of the men immediately argued that the song was meant to “hype women.” I tried very genuinely to explain that intent does not erase impact. That in a patriarchal society, repeatedly framing women as party props is not neutral. It trains people—men and women alike—to subconsciously accept women as background decoration rather than full participants in life.
One man then confidently announced that he “knows what all females are like.”
I paused because I was very very triggered.
Then I reminded him that he was, in fact, speaking to a “female,” and that the only thing universally true about women is that we are human beings. Complex, varied, contradictory humans who deserve the same rights, respect, and autonomy as men.
He brushed that aside and said it wasn’t a gender issue at all. According to him, “we all know women want money.”
That statement alone could fuel an entire thesis.
Men want money. Men chase money. Men build entire identities around money. Capitalism does not discriminate by gender. Yet somehow, when men pursue wealth, it’s ambition. When women do, it becomes moral failure.
I pointed this out.
He doubled down. “Women will do anything for money.”
And that was the moment the hypocrisy became impossible to ignore.
These are the same people who cry “not all men” whenever men are criticised. The same people who demand nuance, individuality, and fairness when the spotlight turns on them. But when women are the subject, suddenly all women are the same. Suddenly generalisation is truth. Suddenly stereotypes are facts.
What angered me most wasn’t just the weaponised ignorance, it was the absolute certainty with which he said those things. The way some people feel entitled to speak over women, define women, and dismiss women while standing right in front of one.
I didn’t go to the gym to be a spokesperson for feminism. I didn’t go to debate my humanity. I went to feel comfortable in my skin again.
But when simply existing as a woman with boundaries, opinions, and critical thinking is seen as disruptive, then the issue isn’t women being “too much.”
The issue is that too many people are comfortable with women being less.
Turning off the music wasn’t me deciding to be dramatic. I did it because I refuse to be comfortable in a space that women are seen as uncomfortable.
Because I am tired of shrinking myself in spaces that already demand so much silence from women. I am tired of being expected to laugh, endure, or explain away things that chip at our dignity bit by bit.
If my presence makes the room uncomfortable, maybe the room needs to change, not me.

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