How would you go about explaining systemic sexism to someone who just doesn’t see it?
I've been thinking about this - and I realise this has correspondences for disaffected groups, but I keep reminding myself that women hold up half the sky. What comes to mind is Vasily Grossman's character, Viktor Shtrum, in his novel Life and Fate (Shtrum is living under a totalitarian regime but I think systemic sexism has strong similarities with the visceral writing here):
But an invisible force was crushing him. He could feel its weight, its hypnotic power; it was forcing him to think as it wanted, to write as it dictated. This force was inside him; it could dissolve his will and cause his heart to stop beating; it came between him and his family; it insinuated itself into his past, into his childhood memories. He began to feel that he really was untalented and boring, someone who wore out the people around him with dull chatter. Even his work seemed to have grown dull, to be covered with a layer of dust; the thought of it no longer filled him with light and joy.
Only people who have never felt such a force themselves can be surprised that others submit to it. Those who have felt it, on the other hand, feel astonished that a man can rebel against it even for a moment—with one sudden word of anger, one timid gesture of protest.
I usually think about this in the context of freedom - but when you asked about systemic sexism, this is what came to mind.