British Women Are Angry. Of Course We Bloody Are.

British women are angry. A new survey has placed them among the angriest in Europe, with 22% answering “yes” when asked whether they had felt angry “during a lot of the day yesterday.” They’re not the angriest — that honor belongs to the women of Malta, more than a quarter of whom spent “yesterday” vibrating with rage. British women are also out-angered by women in Greece, the Czech Republic, Albania and Spain. 

Still. I, a British woman, would like it known: of course I’m bloody angry.

I’m angry at politicians. I’m angry that everything seems to cost more than it did a few months ago, and that I can trace that rise in costs directly to the decision making of one man on the other side of the Atlantic, who will this weekend celebrate his birthday in the most gauche way I can think of. (I'm not angry that the forecast that evening is currently for showers.)

I’m angry that I have to ask my kids a minimum 15 times to put their shoes on, and that they always find two or three excuses to squirm out of my grasp before I can clean their teeth or brush their hair or apply sunscreen. I’m angry that they lose their hats and won’t drink water when I ask them to and complain when I offer new foods — and I’m also angry that all of this tooth brushing and sunscreen application and food introduction might be completely pointless, because people are now talking about World War Three. 

I’m angry at AI and its relentless march, with IPOs on the horizon that could be in the trillions despite the fact that even the companies creating AI seem worried about its long-term effects on society. I’m angry that, per the viral social media post, while all the robots seem to want to replace screenwriters, very few are picking plastic out of the ocean. I’m angry every time I forget to put “-ai” in a search query, and Gemini chirpily pipes up with an answer which is often wrong, like the over-confident intern no-one wants to hear from. 

I’m angry that, although abortion has finally been decriminalized in the U.K., the leader of Reform, one of the U.K.’s biggest political parties, has accepted £83,000 ($111,000) in payments and hospitality from U.S.-based right-wing anti-abortion groups. I’m angry that there are pregnancy crisis centers – organizations that put a thin clinical veneer over pro-life propaganda – here in the U.K., a country where religion and medicine rarely mix.  

I'm angry that being a woman in 2026 feels less safe than it did in 2016, or 2006, or 1996: In the U.K., violence against women and girls makes up 20% of all recorded crime. I'm angry that the Taliban's tyranny over women in Afghanistan has now reached the point where it has enabled child marriage. I'm angry that maternal mortality in the U.K. has increased by 20% since 2009 (although our figure, eight deaths per 100,000 births, is still significantly below the U.S.'s, at 17).

I'm angry that human trafficking is still rampant, that female genital mutilation still occurs, that women and girls are finding themselves in war zones for wars they didn’t start and didn’t ask for, at sexual violence. I'm angry at genocides and famines and wars, and at my powerlessness over the fact that they continue to rage.

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The PersistentEmma Haslett

I’m angry that my train ticket from my small town in Kent to London this week cost me £30 ($40), the equivalent of 60p a mile, and that literally minutes after I booked it, I got an email saying the train would probably be delayed. 

I’m angry that I had to miss work two weeks ago when my kid’s nursery closed because the water company inexplicably shut off supply to 22,000 homes and businesses in my area, citing “extra demand” as though it couldn’t possibly have been able to predict it during a heatwave; then sent an email asking me to be “mindful” about using water, as though its decision not to invest in infrastructure was my fault. 

I'm angry that there is still a gender pay gap. I'm angry that women still are expected to do work for free and smile and are the predominant care workers for kids and the aging generation.

I’m angry that a nationalist social media trend whereby people hang nasty, cheap, polyester England flags on lamp posts reached our town, because it makes us all look racist — and also, what’s going to happen to those cheap polyester flags when the trend isn’t a trend any more? I’m angry that so much cheap polyester is so readily available, and that no-one is doing anything about the petrochemical companies that manufacture it. 

I’m angry that my daughter's school keeps scheduling meetings during the precious six hours a day I have to earn money, and that I’m the only one who can attend them, because my husband works in an industry where days off aren't an option. 

I’m angry that I can’t afford a nice vacation this year — and none of my friends can either, which means everyone is suddenly really into camping. I hate camping. I’m angry that we bought the wrong tent, and that I can’t find a rain coat I like. 

I’m angry that my kids fight — All. The. Time.

I’m angry that social media has caused my friends to feel they have to be a perfect version of themselves in front of their kids or they will somehow cause them irreparable damage. And I’m angry that so many of my friends have gotten Botox. I’m angry that I still might get Botox. I’m angry that we, women, can’t just age in peace.

I’m angry that a woman shook her head at me this morning when I drove down the narrowish street in our town that you can comfortably fit two cars down, for god’s sake, but people nevertheless insist on waiting at the end in the interests of being polite. It causes massive tailbacks at rush hour. 

I’m angry that I’m so angry, because being this angry all the time is exhausting.

But if I’m completely honest, a small part of me believes that being angry is important work. It’s the only way Things Will Get Done. Anger gets a bad rap — but it’s also the driving force behind change. If I don’t get angry in the face of all this injustice, who will? 

On that note, what are you angry about?