Feminist Nazi

1989Pejorative label / image macrosemi-active

Also known as: Feminazi · Femi-Nazi

Feminazi is a 1989-1990s pejorative image macro featuring strawman feminist arguments on angry-woman photos, used to mock feminists as irrational extremists.

Feminist Nazi, more commonly shortened to Feminazi, is a pejorative label and image macro format used to mock feminists by portraying them as irrational, hypocritical extremists. The term was first documented in a 1989 *Los Angeles Times* article and later popularized by conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh in the early 1990s4. The associated image macro, which puts strawman feminist arguments over a photo of an angry woman, spread widely across social media in the early-to-mid 2010s, with individual examples shared over 166,000 times1.

feminism memesimage macro memesculture war memesgender stereotype memesmanosphere memes

Overview

The Feminist Nazi meme exists in two overlapping forms. The first is the word "feminazi" itself, a portmanteau of "feminist" and "Nazi" that functions as a blanket insult against women's rights advocates4. The second is a specific image macro format featuring a photograph of a woman with an intense or angry expression, overlaid with text presenting exaggerated or fabricated feminist positions designed to make feminism look absurd1.

The image macro version typically follows a pattern: the top text states a hyperbolic "feminist" demand, while the bottom text reveals a supposed contradiction or double standard. The woman in the photo has no actual connection to feminism. She's simply a stock angry face used as a prop1.

The earliest documented use of "feminazi" appeared in a 1989 *Los Angeles Times* article covering an anti-abortion protest where demonstrators carried signs reading "Feminazis Go Home"4. The term stayed obscure until Rush Limbaugh picked it up and broadcast it to millions of listeners starting in the early 1990s. Limbaugh credited University of California professor Thomas Hazlett with coining the word4.

Limbaugh defined "feminazi" narrowly at first, claiming it referred only to "radical feminists" whose goal was "to see that there are as many abortions as possible"4. He characterized this as a small group of "militants" driven by a "quest for power" and a "belief that men aren't necessary"4. In practice, as *The New Partridge Dictionary of Slang* noted, Limbaugh used the term "to marginalize any feminist as a hardline, uncompromising manhater"4.

Despite claiming on his June 2005 broadcast that he hadn't "used that term on this program in years," Media Matters documented him using "feminazis" eight times in a six-week span in March and April 2004 alone3. On the same 2005 broadcast, Limbaugh doubled down: "it still gets to 'em, doesn't it? And you know why? Because it's right. Because it's accurate"3.

Origin & Background

Platform
*Los Angeles Times* (earliest print use), *The Rush Limbaugh Show* (popularized term), Facebook / Reddit (image macro format)
Key People
Thomas Hazlett, Rush Limbaugh, Unknown
Date
1989 (term), ~2012 (image macro)

The earliest documented use of "feminazi" appeared in a 1989 *Los Angeles Times* article covering an anti-abortion protest where demonstrators carried signs reading "Feminazis Go Home". The term stayed obscure until Rush Limbaugh picked it up and broadcast it to millions of listeners starting in the early 1990s. Limbaugh credited University of California professor Thomas Hazlett with coining the word.

Limbaugh defined "feminazi" narrowly at first, claiming it referred only to "radical feminists" whose goal was "to see that there are as many abortions as possible". He characterized this as a small group of "militants" driven by a "quest for power" and a "belief that men aren't necessary". In practice, as *The New Partridge Dictionary of Slang* noted, Limbaugh used the term "to marginalize any feminist as a hardline, uncompromising manhater".

Despite claiming on his June 2005 broadcast that he hadn't "used that term on this program in years," Media Matters documented him using "feminazis" eight times in a six-week span in March and April 2004 alone. On the same 2005 broadcast, Limbaugh doubled down: "it still gets to 'em, doesn't it? And you know why? Because it's right. Because it's accurate".

How It Spread

The term filtered from talk radio into general internet culture throughout the 2000s. Urban Dictionary entries for both "feminist nazi" and "feminazi" accumulated definitions reflecting the anti-feminist framing Limbaugh had established.

The image macro format took off around 2012. Jezebel covered the meme that year, calling it "the world's worst meme". The format spread heavily on Facebook, where individual Feminist Nazi memes were shared anywhere from a few hundred to over 166,000 times. The blog *We Hunted the Mammoth* ran a multi-part series in April 2016 dissecting the meme's logic (or lack thereof), pointing out that "NO FEMINIST HAS EVER SAID ANYTHING LIKE THE STUFF IN THESE MEMES". The memes attributed positions to feminists that no actual feminist held, like demanding men pay for everything while simultaneously claiming to want equality.

Meanwhile, the underlying term spread well beyond Limbaugh's audience. Linguist Geraldine Horan tracked a pattern where mainstream media use of "feminazi" spiked whenever a prominent woman made headlines. Usage in the United Kingdom peaked in 2015 during coverage of barrister Charlotte Proudman, who had publicly criticized a male colleague for commenting on her appearance online. In Australia, broader adoption followed the 1995 publication of Helen Garner's *The First Stone*.

How to Use This Meme

The image macro format typically works like this:

1

Take a photo of a woman looking angry or intense (the original format used one specific stock-style image)

2

Write a top line presenting an exaggerated or invented "feminist" position ("Demands equal pay...")

3

Write a bottom line revealing a supposed hypocrisy or contradiction ("...expects men to pay for dinner")

4

The humor relies on the reader accepting the premise that actual feminists hold these contradictory views

Cultural Impact

The word "feminazi" left a significant mark on how Americans talk about feminism. Literary critic Toril Moi argued that Limbaugh's popularization of the term shifted public perception of feminism across the political spectrum starting in the mid-1990s. Americans increasingly saw feminists as "dogmatic and power-hungry women who hate men," and the label made feminism itself toxic. Women who agreed with feminist goals hesitated to call themselves feminists, and "feminism became 'the F-word'".

Gloria Steinem pushed back directly, noting "I've never met anyone who fits that description" of wanting as many abortions as possible. Steinem called for a boycott of Limbaugh and pointed out the irony: "Hitler came to power against the strong feminist movement in Germany, padlocked the family planning clinics, and declared abortion a crime against the state, all views that more closely resemble Rush Limbaugh's".

Sociologist Michael Kimmel, in his book *Angry White Men*, argued the term was weaponized against feminist campaigns for equal pay and protection from rape and domestic violence by associating those goals with Nazi genocide. Helen Lewis, then deputy editor of the *New Statesman*, called it "just deeply ignorant" and "self-undermining, because it's so over the top".

The image macro variant, while popular in raw share numbers, drew consistent criticism for relying entirely on invented arguments. As *We Hunted the Mammoth* documented across dozens of examples, the memes attacked positions that no feminist actually held, making them effective propaganda but poor argumentation.

Fun Facts

Limbaugh recounted being invited to the 92nd Street Y in New York and defending the term by comparing abortion to the Holocaust. "You could have felt the ice. The room chilled," he said. He was never invited back.

Media Matters tracked Limbaugh using "feminazis" to describe both the National Center for Women & Policing and the Feminist Majority Foundation on a May 2004 broadcast.

Laura Bates, founder of the Everyday Sexism Project, said of the term: "It's a desperate attempt to demonise us, and it's frustrating, because if it wasn't such an offensive word, you could actually start to embrace it and own it".

The *New York Times* described "feminazi" as "one of [Limbaugh's] favorite epithets for supporters of women's rights".

Frequently Asked Questions

Feminist Nazi

1989Pejorative label / image macrosemi-active

Also known as: Feminazi · Femi-Nazi

Feminazi is a 1989-1990s pejorative image macro featuring strawman feminist arguments on angry-woman photos, used to mock feminists as irrational extremists.

Feminist Nazi, more commonly shortened to Feminazi, is a pejorative label and image macro format used to mock feminists by portraying them as irrational, hypocritical extremists. The term was first documented in a 1989 *Los Angeles Times* article and later popularized by conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh in the early 1990s. The associated image macro, which puts strawman feminist arguments over a photo of an angry woman, spread widely across social media in the early-to-mid 2010s, with individual examples shared over 166,000 times.

feminism memes image macro memes culture war memes gender stereotype memes manosphere memes

Overview

The Feminist Nazi meme exists in two overlapping forms. The first is the word "feminazi" itself, a portmanteau of "feminist" and "Nazi" that functions as a blanket insult against women's rights advocates. The second is a specific image macro format featuring a photograph of a woman with an intense or angry expression, overlaid with text presenting exaggerated or fabricated feminist positions designed to make feminism look absurd.

The image macro version typically follows a pattern: the top text states a hyperbolic "feminist" demand, while the bottom text reveals a supposed contradiction or double standard. The woman in the photo has no actual connection to feminism. She's simply a stock angry face used as a prop.

The earliest documented use of "feminazi" appeared in a 1989 *Los Angeles Times* article covering an anti-abortion protest where demonstrators carried signs reading "Feminazis Go Home". The term stayed obscure until Rush Limbaugh picked it up and broadcast it to millions of listeners starting in the early 1990s. Limbaugh credited University of California professor Thomas Hazlett with coining the word.

Limbaugh defined "feminazi" narrowly at first, claiming it referred only to "radical feminists" whose goal was "to see that there are as many abortions as possible". He characterized this as a small group of "militants" driven by a "quest for power" and a "belief that men aren't necessary". In practice, as *The New Partridge Dictionary of Slang* noted, Limbaugh used the term "to marginalize any feminist as a hardline, uncompromising manhater".

Despite claiming on his June 2005 broadcast that he hadn't "used that term on this program in years," Media Matters documented him using "feminazis" eight times in a six-week span in March and April 2004 alone. On the same 2005 broadcast, Limbaugh doubled down: "it still gets to 'em, doesn't it? And you know why? Because it's right. Because it's accurate".

Origin & Background

Platform
*Los Angeles Times* (earliest print use), *The Rush Limbaugh Show* (popularized term), Facebook / Reddit (image macro format)
Key People
Thomas Hazlett, Rush Limbaugh, Unknown
Date
1989 (term), ~2012 (image macro)

The earliest documented use of "feminazi" appeared in a 1989 *Los Angeles Times* article covering an anti-abortion protest where demonstrators carried signs reading "Feminazis Go Home". The term stayed obscure until Rush Limbaugh picked it up and broadcast it to millions of listeners starting in the early 1990s. Limbaugh credited University of California professor Thomas Hazlett with coining the word.

Limbaugh defined "feminazi" narrowly at first, claiming it referred only to "radical feminists" whose goal was "to see that there are as many abortions as possible". He characterized this as a small group of "militants" driven by a "quest for power" and a "belief that men aren't necessary". In practice, as *The New Partridge Dictionary of Slang* noted, Limbaugh used the term "to marginalize any feminist as a hardline, uncompromising manhater".

Despite claiming on his June 2005 broadcast that he hadn't "used that term on this program in years," Media Matters documented him using "feminazis" eight times in a six-week span in March and April 2004 alone. On the same 2005 broadcast, Limbaugh doubled down: "it still gets to 'em, doesn't it? And you know why? Because it's right. Because it's accurate".

How It Spread

The term filtered from talk radio into general internet culture throughout the 2000s. Urban Dictionary entries for both "feminist nazi" and "feminazi" accumulated definitions reflecting the anti-feminist framing Limbaugh had established.

The image macro format took off around 2012. Jezebel covered the meme that year, calling it "the world's worst meme". The format spread heavily on Facebook, where individual Feminist Nazi memes were shared anywhere from a few hundred to over 166,000 times. The blog *We Hunted the Mammoth* ran a multi-part series in April 2016 dissecting the meme's logic (or lack thereof), pointing out that "NO FEMINIST HAS EVER SAID ANYTHING LIKE THE STUFF IN THESE MEMES". The memes attributed positions to feminists that no actual feminist held, like demanding men pay for everything while simultaneously claiming to want equality.

Meanwhile, the underlying term spread well beyond Limbaugh's audience. Linguist Geraldine Horan tracked a pattern where mainstream media use of "feminazi" spiked whenever a prominent woman made headlines. Usage in the United Kingdom peaked in 2015 during coverage of barrister Charlotte Proudman, who had publicly criticized a male colleague for commenting on her appearance online. In Australia, broader adoption followed the 1995 publication of Helen Garner's *The First Stone*.

How to Use This Meme

The image macro format typically works like this:

1

Take a photo of a woman looking angry or intense (the original format used one specific stock-style image)

2

Write a top line presenting an exaggerated or invented "feminist" position ("Demands equal pay...")

3

Write a bottom line revealing a supposed hypocrisy or contradiction ("...expects men to pay for dinner")

4

The humor relies on the reader accepting the premise that actual feminists hold these contradictory views

Cultural Impact

The word "feminazi" left a significant mark on how Americans talk about feminism. Literary critic Toril Moi argued that Limbaugh's popularization of the term shifted public perception of feminism across the political spectrum starting in the mid-1990s. Americans increasingly saw feminists as "dogmatic and power-hungry women who hate men," and the label made feminism itself toxic. Women who agreed with feminist goals hesitated to call themselves feminists, and "feminism became 'the F-word'".

Gloria Steinem pushed back directly, noting "I've never met anyone who fits that description" of wanting as many abortions as possible. Steinem called for a boycott of Limbaugh and pointed out the irony: "Hitler came to power against the strong feminist movement in Germany, padlocked the family planning clinics, and declared abortion a crime against the state, all views that more closely resemble Rush Limbaugh's".

Sociologist Michael Kimmel, in his book *Angry White Men*, argued the term was weaponized against feminist campaigns for equal pay and protection from rape and domestic violence by associating those goals with Nazi genocide. Helen Lewis, then deputy editor of the *New Statesman*, called it "just deeply ignorant" and "self-undermining, because it's so over the top".

The image macro variant, while popular in raw share numbers, drew consistent criticism for relying entirely on invented arguments. As *We Hunted the Mammoth* documented across dozens of examples, the memes attacked positions that no feminist actually held, making them effective propaganda but poor argumentation.

Fun Facts

Limbaugh recounted being invited to the 92nd Street Y in New York and defending the term by comparing abortion to the Holocaust. "You could have felt the ice. The room chilled," he said. He was never invited back.

Media Matters tracked Limbaugh using "feminazis" to describe both the National Center for Women & Policing and the Feminist Majority Foundation on a May 2004 broadcast.

Laura Bates, founder of the Everyday Sexism Project, said of the term: "It's a desperate attempt to demonise us, and it's frustrating, because if it wasn't such an offensive word, you could actually start to embrace it and own it".

The *New York Times* described "feminazi" as "one of [Limbaugh's] favorite epithets for supporters of women's rights".

Frequently Asked Questions