If you’ve chosen to inflict bigotry on a loved one, try this.

How can I console my girlfriend after calling her a slut?

“Dear [your girlfriend’s name]:

I’m truly sorry for being a monumental asshole and calling you a name that specifically targets your gender and sexuality.

I recognize that the world has hatefully done this for millennia against outspoken, proudly sexual, and independent women. I engaged in this cowardly and insecure behavior as a way to control, humiliate, and intimidate you because of my own shortcomings.

I promise to own my shit, address my fears honestly and openly, and not attack you or any other woman that rightly defies misogyny in its many forms.

If you decide not to forgive me, I will do everything in my power to respect every girl and woman I encounter and call out hatred of the feminine, girls, and women every time I can.

If a woman wants/if women want to establish a relationship with me where she reclaims/they reclaim slurs, I will not assume it’s okay for me to use them [a] outside of a sexual/romantic context where I’ve explicitly been granted scenario-specific approval and [b] on behalf of proudly identifying slur reclaimers (if I am not in the group that’s been targeted for misogyny).

If you do forgive me, I will continue to do what I promised if you had not and recognize how very lucky I am. I won’t waste this chance by conveniently ‘forgetting’ and doing it, or something similar, again when it’s easy for and lazy of me to take advantage of bigotry for my own miserable purposes.

Your humble and grateful partner, if you still want me,

[Insert your name here]”