I am currently undertaking my PhD, and it is exhilarating. But it is also incredibly challenging, exhausting, and at times, overwhelming. I dream of the day I finish and earn the highest academic qualification one can achieve.
My supervisor, a wonderful and inspiring woman, once told me that it is a journey and there is a reason only one per cent of the population ever earns a PhD. It is hard. It requires resilience, dedication, and an unwavering belief in your own intellect, even when the path is steep and the work often lonely.
So, when I saw Dr Juliet Turner, only 27, celebrate her success on X with the comment, “I passed my viva exam! After four years of research, I successfully defended my thesis. You can call me doctor”, I should have been able to simply celebrate with her.
Instead, what unfolded was a disturbing, bizarre meltdown from men online.
One man replied, “Just look at the degree on that chick — no man ever.”
From there, an avalanche of vitriol poured in, with comments including:
“You are 30 years old with no husband or kids … but hey, at least you have your cats.”
“They are just handing out doctorates to anyone now.”
“You could have had four babies in that time.”
“Them eggs aren’t getting any younger.”
Women online responded admirably. Many shared pictures of themselves in academic robes, degrees in hand, captioned “Just look at the degree on that chick,” reclaiming the narrative.
But beyond the clever hashtag, the real question remains – why do so many men react with such hostility when women claim their brilliance?
There is nothing remotely shameful about Dr Turner’s achievement. Her PhD was not performed for male approval, nor to be “acceptable” to some archaic standard of femininity. Her thesis — on the evolution of cooperation and division of labour in insects — is intellectually rigorous, scientifically valuable, and no doubt demanded courage, creativity and resilience. It is deeply troubling that so many of the attacks reduced her to stereotypes about fertility, marriage, and cats robbing her of agency, diminishing her intelligence, and asserting that a young woman’s worth is still judged by her relationship status or reproductive timeline.
This toxic reaction is not just about one badly behaved corner of social media. It reflects deeper systemic misogyny. For centuries, patriarchal structures have insisted that a woman’s rightful place is not in lecture halls, labs or research institutes, but in the home as a wife, mother or caretaker. When a woman dares to say “no” to that limited definition, to prioritise education, career and independence, the backlash is fierce.
Rather than being celebrated for her commitment to knowledge, Dr Turner was accused of “sacrificing” traditional womanhood. The insinuation is that educated women are weird, threatening, or lonely.
But the data strongly support Dr Turner and every woman scholar who dares to break the mould. In fact, in many parts of the world, women now outperform men in tertiary education. OECD data show that completion rates for bachelor’s degrees are higher for women than men — on average, 48 percent of female entrants graduate within the expected timeframe, compared to 37 percent of male entrants. Women are also more likely to have completed tertiary education around 52 percent of women aged 25‑34 hold a tertiary qualification, compared to 39 percent of me.
Globally, the tide turned years ago. UNESCO reports that, on average, there are now 113 women enrolled in tertiary education for every 100 men. Between 2000 and 2018, women’s enrolment in tertiary education grew more rapidly than men’s and women now make up a majority of undergraduate students in most world regions. Even at doctoral level in the European Union, nearly half of PhD students are women.
So yes, women are earning more, studying deeper, and achieving higher and not because they are trying to impress men, but because they have a right to learn, to think, to contribute. Yet the very strength of that education is weaponised against them. Instead of recognition, there is resentment and instead of applause, there are jokes about cats and childbearing. That’s not admiration, it’s fear. Fear that the structures of male dominance are shifting. Fear that smart, independent women will not conform to the life scripts men have long written for them.
To all those critics who dismissed Dr Turner’s doctorate, your dismissal reveals more about you than about her. You do not get to define her worth. She is not here for your validation. Her achievement is no less because she’s unmarried or childfree; if anything, it is all the more powerful because she claimed her place in a world that still too often resists her.
Dr Turner defended more than her thesis. She defended the right of women everywhere to pursue excellence on their own terms. Congratulations, Dr Juliet Turner. You earned it, and you belong in that robe, in that lecture hall, and in every space your intellect allows. And to the trolls: learn your place.