Ana Marie Cox, a young, hip and extremely bright American blogger for the British newspaper "The Guardian", doesn't think they do, although she does believe there's a gender gap.
I have to say I agree. I don't think that Republicans do hate women, in fact, I'm sure they love them in that condescending way you love things that you judge to be weaker or inferior. No, the problem that Republicans face with women stems from a complete lack of understanding. Quite simply, women, at least modern women, baffle them.
The women Republicans love accept their place in life; they are wives, mothers, church goers, and community volunteers. They may have jobs, but not careers, and if they're paid less than men, well, it's the natural order of things, men, after all, are the breadwinners. The women in a Republican male's world would never say the word "contraceptive" out loud, let alone demand that the government or insurance companies cover its cost. Actually they would not even know there were such things as contraceptives outside the bonds of marriage. And if some misguided, naive, or worse, wanton little miss gets herself pregnant, she needs Republican male guidance to keep her from adding insult to injury by having an abortion. Anyone should be able to see that the new abortion restrictions enacted by Republican male legislators across the country such as vaginal probes, 72 hour waiting periods, a permission slip from the father and the requirement that doctors show women pictures of fetuses, are for the woman's own good.
There's no hatred behind the view that women are soft, delicate creatures who need the clear headed, non-hormone influenced thinking of men to help them make intelligent, responsible choices. It's just that women are like children who need constant supervision and protection from their own silly ideas and worst impulses. If that supervision and protection comes in the form of denying women access to healthcare, limiting their ability to have medically safe abortions, paying them less than men who are doing the same job, making it harder to feed, clothe and house their children or send them to college, it's only because Republican men care so much.
Which makes total sense if you think about it in relation to noted linguist George Lakoff's definition of the Republican party as patriarchal. These are men who are used to making the rules and being obeyed. As far as they're concerned women reached the pinnacle of perfection in 1957 with June Cleaver, which is the last time Republican men really understood the opposite sex. Today's shrill, femininazis yelling about equality and whining about their reproductive rights are a complete mystery to them.