play the gender card

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play the gender card (third-person singular simple present plays the gender card, present participle playing the gender card, simple past and past participle played the gender card)

1. (idiomatic, often derogatory) To assert that sexism is involved in a situation, especially in order to exploit sexist or antisexist attitudes.
   • 2003, Finding Nemo, spoken by Marlin (Albert Brooks), 01:04:56 from the start:

     Oh, I don't wanna play the gender card card right now. You wanna play a card? Let's play the "let's not die" card.

   • 2008 January 8, Steinem, Gloria, “Women Are Never Front-Runners”, in The New York Times‎, →ISSN:

     What worries me is that she is accused of "playing the gender card" when citing the old boys’ club, while he is seen as unifying by citing civil rights confrontations.

   • 2010, Fedorchek, Robert, The Translators: A Novel, Bloomington: iUniverse, →ISBN, page 463:

     […] the CAS was going to lose two of its best teachers; tolerate a mediocre one who had skillfully played the gender card by hiding behind her pregnancy; and retain an ineffective one.

   • 2013 June 19, “Did someone play their gender card at you? Poor baby.”, in We, the Intelligentsia, …‎, archived from the original on 29 March 2014:

     How can you tell the difference between someone playing the gender card and someone actually calling out misogyny when you so obviously have no expertise on the matter?

• play the race card

• play the victim card