The author of Rage Becomes Her says that women in their thirties, forties, and fifties grew up with the promise of equality, that they could do everything. But equality in the law, does not translate into equality in daily life, or what equality meant to women, she tells me. “This is why women simmer, and will continue to do so,” Chemaly says.

It’s no longer about having it all. It’s the doing it all that is infuriating women around the world.

The Gallup World Poll, which surveys more than 120,000 people in more than 150 countries each year, asks participants several lifestyle questions, including what emotions they felt for much of the previous day. In 2022, the poll revealed that women persistently reported bad feelings such as anger, stress, worry, and sadness more often than men.

“The rage gap is particularly extreme – and rising – in some countries,” Chemaly says.

In India, amid the pandemic in 2021, 40.6% of women “felt anger” during a lot of the previous day compared with 27.8% of men. Those numbers are up significantly from around 30% (women) and 26% (men) in 2012.

In Cambodia, which ranked 89th out of 146 on the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Index in 2020, the difference in the number of women and men who reported feeling angry the previous day was at 17% — much higher than the world average of 6%.

Women across the world, even in traditionally patriarchal societies like India, are talking about relationships, friendships, family dynamics, mental load, lower pay, and physical and mental labour, and why they are doing it all with a smile.

The anger is also leading many women to break up with the institution of marriage.

The median age of first marriage in the United States rose from a 1956 low of 20.1 for women and 22.5 for men to 27.1 for women and 29.2 for men in 2016. Marriage rates have been declining for decades in the UK and Australia, and are currently at the lowest point in recorded history.

The trend is global, with 89% of the world’s population living in a country with falling marriage rates.

Divorces are also on the rise. In the US, where no-fault divorce is legal, some estimates put the figure at 70%. In the UK, ONS statistics showed women petitioned for 62% of divorces in England and Wales in 2019.

Divorce was exceptionally uncommon before 1914 in the UK, with just one divorce in every 450 marriages reported in the first decade of the 20th century. More than 100,000 couples in the UK get divorced every year now while half the marriages in the US end in divorce.

Statistics from Latin America, Africa and Asia suggest that the decline of marriage is not happening only in rich countries. There has been a drop in marriage rates in majority of countries between 1990 and 2010.

More and more women across the world have become educated, employed and economically independent, but find themselves tethered down by archaic systems and culture. This dissonance between the patriarchal systems at home and being an emancipated woman outside fuels the rage.

Gender inequality in society, the workplace and the home play a huge part. Chemaly blames the fact that women are expected to work “tirelessly” day after day, and “with no kind of legitimate boundaries”. Women seemingly tend to snap by the time they hit 40, according to experts.

In a freewheeling interview, Chemaly speaks about women’s rising anger, how COVID exacerbated the situation, and the power of women’s rage.

Why are women worldwide getting angrier?

Women who are in their thirties, forties, and fifties grew up with the promise of equality, that they could do everything men could do. What equality meant to women was that they would get to live freely, like their male counterparts. But equality in the law does not translate into daily life.

Covid was an eye opener. It showcased the shocking imbalance between men and women in heterosexual relationships, especially when it came to time shared among them for work, home, child, and exercise. It made women realise their time poverty and disparity.

The pandemic exacerbated the situation. It was really hard for all women, women in the frontline and women at home, and led to simmering frustration and anger. It upset the balance and amplified the problem, leading to a macho fascist backlash around the world. We see it in our politics, in the hostility online, in neighbours’ behaviour.

Did the “I-can-do-it-all” mindset lead to women’s burnout?

The “I can do it all” gets conflated with “I have to do it all”. Women are forced to their limit, they’re forced to think about who will do it if they don’t. For centuries, we have been socialised to see that people are safe, warm, and fed. Women are now wondering if someone would do it if they stopped. They can’t help but ask, “Who is doing it for me?” The lack of reciprocity makes them frustrated, resentful, and angry.

It’s true that women across the world are burning out, they are haemorrhaging, they are exhausted. The problem is way bigger than we think it is.

Did hybrid working added to the problem?

Women are pushing for hybrid work much more than men. That’s understandable as the pandemic made it possible to test new work formats.

That said, a working mother’s day at home isn’t easy -- managing the needs of children, school time tables, work calendars, life agendas, all around her spouse’s schedule while planning menus. This led to stress of different needs bumping into each other all the time.

But there’s no denying the fact that work from home carves out time, it reduces the time stress. Women no longer want to go into office five days a week, but when people like Elon Musk make it mandatory to clock in five days out of seven, he’s telling women, “We don’t need you”.

Is this why more women are deciding to stay single?

Women now find that it’s easier to be single. In South Korea, Italy, and US, many women are boycotting marriage or choosing to be queer.

Men benefit from marriage, women don’t. That’s why women are asking themselves “Why on earth would I subject myself to this?” As many as 70% of divorces in the US are initiated by women.

I think the heterosexual model is not working for women worldwide. But this has led to tension in society, especially among more conservative people. They see this as the downfall of society and come up with a solution: denying women reproductive freedom.

How do children alter the family dynamics?

Women can seemingly “do it all” until children enter the equation. But the workplace is skewed. Salaries and negotiations depend on whether women will have a baby. Once they have children, the rubber hits the road.

Men feel a different kind of pressure, focusing on money to take care of their new family setup. However, women have to juggle an old role with a new role, something that men don’t have to do or think about. Women end up navigating numerous micro aggressions and misplaced bellicosity every single day.

How do you see the consequences of this playing out?

Did you know that women in Italy simply stopped having babies 10 years ago. The consequence is there for us all to see: population decline. And that brings out everyone’s worry, “How will we sustain our society?” Women’s bodies are taken to be a public resource; they must work and have babies.. So when women say they don’t have to have babies, they don’t need them, everyone is worried, including governments. We’ve seen how rattled the US is, the conservatives are, as the population declines.

Racial dynamics also come into play, with an idea of “control” over which babies are born. The idea is to control women – and that is where reproductive injustice begins.

How can women make anger work for them?

Anger drives social change. Female rage can be a catalyst for change: we have seen women’s wrath work in movements such as #MeToo, protests against sexual violence in India and Pakistan, and the Iranian women’s uprising.

When women put their foot down, take things into their own hands, they enable change in communities. Women need to ask themselves, “What is my anger telling me?”

Nobody likes being angry, but your anger is telling you something important – it could be about work, a relationship, or some other facet of life.

Can changing the way we react change things for women?

I feel that younger generations are much more conservative and need to take back the power. Not knowing and accepting their anger is making women and girls sick. Suppressed anger is leading to anxiety, depression, headaches and backpains, chronic fatigue, and dysregulated hormonal systems.

Women need to learn anger management skills. Anger is typically considered “a marker of masculinity”, which is why it doesn’t make women pretty, popular, or help them advance in any sphere of life. But women’s anger can be a catalyst for change, and we need to learn to harness it to deal with vital issues like inequality, the loss of reproductive rights, and violence that women everywhere face.