Every few months, a video goes viral that makes you stop and think- not because it’s profound, but because it’s horrifying. The latest comes from Dale Partridge, a Christian author and influencer, who with a calm voice and a gentle smile suggests something monstrous: that women should no longer have the right to vote.
He doesn’t shout, doesn’t sneer, doesn’t pound his fists. Instead, he delivers what sounds like a sermon: “Women were not made to lead, but to follow and to feel. This is God’s design.”
His argument? The last 100 years of American “moral decline”- abortion rights, same-sex marriage, immigration reform, even Barack Obama’s election- all happened because women were allowed to vote. His solution? Repeal the 19th Amendment and return to a “household vote,” where women “share their thoughts” with the men in their lives, but only men make the final decision.
It’s the 21st century. Yet here we are, debating whether half of America deserves to participate in democracy.
Repeal the 19th Amendment and restore the household vote. pic.twitter.com/MIFI1gcbzx
— Dale Partridge (@dalepartridge) November 5, 2025
The Pseudo-Science of Misogyny
Partridge claims “statistics” support his point. He says women are:
- “Twice as likely as men to be seduced into an affair,”
- “26% more likely to be financially scammed online,”
- “Three times more likely to fall prey to psychics, tarot readers, and astrology.”
And from these cherry-picked, context-free numbers, he draws the absurd conclusion that women are too emotional to vote rationally.
But here’s what the data actually shows:
- In 2024, women made up 56% of registered voters in the U.S., according to Pew Research.
- Women consistently outvote men- by around 8 percentage points in every major election since 1980.
- Women donate more to charities, volunteer more hours, and are less likely to engage in violent crime, corruption, or extremism.
- In countries with higher female participation in governance, corruption rates drop, literacy rates rise, and infant mortality falls – a 2022 UNDP report quantified the correlation as “statistically significant and causally linked.”
So if we’re measuring who’s better at governing society, women aren’t the problem, they’re the proof that humanity is capable of progress.
When Religion Becomes a Cage
Dale Partridge calls his argument “biblical.” He cites “God’s design” as justification for hierarchy. But the Bible he quotes selectively is also full of women who led, fought, and prophesied. Deborah judged Israel. Esther saved her people. Mary Magdalene was the first to proclaim resurrection.
To say “women were made to follow” isn’t religion- it’s fear wrapped in scripture. It’s the age-old tactic of patriarchal power: claim divine authority to justify domination.
This is the same theology that told enslaved people to “obey their masters,” that told indigenous children their souls needed to be “saved” by force, that told women they were made from man’s rib, and must forever live under his shadow. Partridge’s gentle tone hides a violent idea: that democracy should not belong to everyone, that equality itself is against God.
The Psychological Trick: “I Say This Because I Love You”
One of the most manipulative parts of his message comes near the end. Dale Partridge says:
“I don’t want to repeal the 19th Amendment because I don’t love women. I want to repeal it because I love America, and I love women enough to protect them from political exploitation.”
This is the language of abusers, not protectors. It’s the same tone used by men who tell their partners they can’t work or go out because “the world is dangerous.” It’s not love, it’s control disguised as care.
The word “protect” appears again and again in far-right discourse, from “protecting family values” to “protecting Western civilization.” What it really means is restrict. Protecting women by taking away their voice is like protecting a bird by breaking its wings.
A Democracy Built on the Backs of Women
Let’s remember the history Dale Partridge wants to erase. When the 19th Amendment was ratified in 1920, it was the result of over 70 years of struggle. Women were jailed, force-fed, beaten by police, and mocked by the press. Leaders like Susan B. Anthony, Ida B. Wells, Sojourner Truth, and Alice Paul faced ridicule that sounds eerily similar to what Partridge says today: that women were “too emotional” and “didn’t understand politics.”
When women finally won the right to vote, they didn’t destroy the nation. They helped rebuild it, during the Great Depression, World War II, and the Civil Rights Movement. The first female voters were the mothers and grandmothers who raised the men who fought fascism abroad. Today, women make up 51% of the workforce, run 13 million businesses, and lead in education and healthcare.
The idea that they should “go back to the household vote” is not conservatism. It’s anti-modern barbarism in a nice Instagram font.
The Modern Echo of Fascist Politics
This rhetoric is not new, it’s recycled. In the 1930s, Mussolini said women should “focus on family, not politics.” In Taliban-run Afghanistan, women are banned from school and government “for their safety.” In Saudi Arabia, women couldn’t vote until 2015.
Now, in America, a man with a podcast is preaching the same message with a Bible in hand. The language has softened, but the goal is the same: to erase women’s agency while pretending to honor their nature.
Who’s Really Being Deceived?
If women were truly as “emotional” and “easily deceived” as Partridge claims, men wouldn’t be the ones falling for every demagogue who promises to make them powerful again.
Look at the data:
- Over 75% of QAnon followers are men.
- Over 90% of violent extremists charged in the U.S. are men.
- Men are four times more likely than women to fall for get-rich-quick investment scams.
So who’s really being deceived here, the woman who believes in empathy and compassion, or the man who believes a YouTube preacher who says democracy should end?
This Isn’t About Women. It’s About Power.
At the root of all this is not faith or morality, it’s fear. Fear that men are losing control over the world they once monopolised. Fear that women, with education and agency, no longer need male approval to exist. Fear that equality isn’t temporary. Dale Partridge’s plea to “protect women” is really a plea to protect male dominance.
The Real Lesson of the 19th Amendment
The 19th Amendment was more than a legal milestone; it was a moral victory. It affirmed a truth older than any nation: that freedom cannot be selective. A democracy that silences women is no democracy at all. To repeal that right would not just turn back the clock, it would tear apart the very idea of America. Because the right to vote is not a gendered privilege. It is the soul of citizenship.
We’ve Come Too Far to Go Back
It took 144 years after the Declaration of Independence for American women to win full voting rights. It took another 45 years for women of color to be guaranteed them under the Voting Rights Act. And now, in 2025, we are watching men go online to argue that it was all a mistake. No. It wasn’t.
Every step toward equality was hard-fought and holy. Every ballot cast by a woman is a reminder that liberty does not belong to one gender, one race, or one faith. If democracy survives this century, it will be because women refused to be erased again.
Love Is Not Control
Dale Partridge says he loves women. But love does not silence. Love does not vote for you. Love does not place you in chains and call them protection. The 19th Amendment was America’s way of saying: We see you. We trust you. We need you. To undo it would not save America, it would finish killing the very idea of it.
