Written by Luella Shasha
On 20 January 2025, Donald Trump was sworn in as the 47th President of the United States.
Outside the Capitol, the crowd of red hats stood like statues against the cold, their faint chants swallowed by the wind. Inside, standing behind Trump, were faces that reflected the forces driving his return—not just political allies, but influential figures from the tech world and beyond, whose platforms and power have helped shape the cultural landscape that made his comeback possible.
Trump’s return to the White House is a reminder that misogyny was never on the fringes—it’s embedded in the system, reshaped and repackaged to fit the moment.
It’s why Trump, despite being found liable for sexually abusing E. Jean Carroll, and openly boasting that his celebrity status allows him to “grab [women] by the pussy” could still be elected president. And it’s why figures like J.D. Vance, who dismisses “childless cat ladies” as symbols of societal decline, have risen to prominence in the corridors of power.
The tech bros
This inauguration was more than a political event. It was a display of the values being elevated—where the people flanking Trump represented a broader ideology that reinforces misogyny, both in the most subtle and outrageously overt ways.
Among them was Elon Musk, who has used his influence to reshape the virtual sphere. Under the banner of “free speech absolutism,” he has reinstated banned figures and amplified their reach, transforming X (formerly Twitter) into a platform where reactionary voices flourish.
One of the most prominent voices exalted in this environment is Andrew Tate, who promotes a worldview in which women are property, and men are entitled to absolute control. Tate’s influence has spread far beyond the internet. Teachers report that boys as young as twelve are mimicking his rhetoric, dismissing female classmates as inferior, expressing attitudes that normalize misogyny and undermine gender equality.
Also standing behind Trump was Mark Zuckerberg, whose influence in shaping public discourse rivals Musk’s. The man who first created Facemash, a platform for college students to rate their peers’ attractiveness, is now overseeing the largest rollback of content moderation in Meta’s (previously Facebook) history. Last month, Zuckerberg announced that Meta would significantly scale back its content moderation efforts, including ending its third-party fact-checking program in the United States. Alongside this, Meta has relaxed certain content restrictions, focusing enforcement on illegal and high-severity violations, effectively opening the floodgates for misogynistic and far-right propaganda to flourish unchecked.
“A stark symbol of an ideology determined to reverse societal progress”
Trump’s allies across the Atlantic were represented as well. Nigel Farage stood proudly among them, a man who claims to champion the protection of women while consistently stoking fear about migrants and separating women into ‘ours’ and ‘theirs’ framing them as threats to “our” women. But Farage’s supposed concern for women’s safety rings hollow when he praises Andrew Tate as an “important voice to emasculated young men” and stands shoulder to shoulder at the inauguration with figures like Conor McGregor, who has been accused of brutally raping Nikita Hand.
Such a political spectacle felt like a stark symbol of an ideology determined to reverse societal progress. It’s seeped into platforms like TikTok, where the “I am not a feminist” trend encourages young women to reject feminism, echoing misogynistic rhetoric disguised as empowerment.
We might believe we’ve come so far, yet, scratch the surface, and the illusion crumbles. The toppling of Edward Colston’s statue in Bristol once felt like a definitive step forward, a reckoning with history. But history does not stay buried, and neither do the forces resisting change. The same city that celebrated anti-racist activism still sees far-right sentiment simmering beneath the surface, just as the same world that saw Trump ousted in 2020 has now watched him return.
Even in liberal enclaves like Bristol, the rhetoric that fuelled Trump’s resurgence—the normalization of misogyny, and the pandering to reactionary voices,—crosses borders. His inauguration is a warning that the struggle for equality is not linear, and it is never finished.
If Trump’s presidency teaches anything, it’s that we cannot afford to look away—these symbols and voices must be confronted, not ignored. This is a transnational fight that must continue to be fought.
