I'd like to start by saying by no means are all women toxic, I'm a female myself and have always been a huge supporter of feminism and "sisterhood" if you will. However the more behaviour I witness from women, I'm starting to stray away from seeing them as allies.
I have worked in female dominated sectors my entire life and have constantly had to witness cliques, gossiping, power plays, passive aggressiveness, and downright bullying. I had to leave my last job as it was affecting my mental health so badly.
I always thought this was just part and parcel of working in groups. However I started a new job last year, with an equal spread of male and female colleagues and there has been none of this. I'm now wondering if the problem with all of my previous workplaces was the fact that they were female dominated.
To me, it's very obvious in person how women favour men over their own gender, regardless of how much "female empowerment" and "Women Supporting Women" is preached these days. For example, they will let men get away with mistakes they wouldn't let other women get away with. Male incompetence is often seen as "cute", whereas the same behaviour coming from a woman would be laughed or sneered at.
There are so many stories coming out in recent years of mothers favouring their sons over their daughters, and at worst bullying and abusing their daughters whilst worshiping their sons. I now think back to my own childhood and I can remember many occasions where my mother would put me down for something, while supporting my male siblings for doing the same thing. There were also a lot of sly, underhand insults that I didn't realize at the time, that were never directed towards my brothers.
I'm prepared to be told IBU, but I'm also very interested in knowing how many people agree, or if anyone has any similar experiences.