When I argue with a sexist, there's an inevitable point at which he will call me "sweetheart". (I like to think of it as shorthand for "you're winning".) If I'm really making him feel foolish, he may resort to "bitch". "Ugly" is the last refuge of the hopelessly destroyed.

I've been writing about feminism on the internet long enough that these names don't really bother me. But nothing is more grating than when a man I don't know - in comments, Twitter or real life - calls me "Jessie".

It may seem odd that I'd prefer a curse to a cutesy nickname. Like most things men call women when they want to diminish them, "Jessie" is meant to remind me that no matter what I accomplish – the number of books written, articles published, speeches given – I'm still "just a girl". But it's the overly-familiar infantilization that really makes my skin crawl. Very creepy Uncle Chester.

As it turns out, it's not just me. Behind every female with an opinion is a man with a sneering nickname for her.

Sophia Wallace, a photographer and feminist artist, tells me, "In professional contexts, I suddenly become 'Sophie' with people who have an issue with me. Usually they think I have exhibited too much leadership and are trying to bring me down."

When I asked Rebecca Traister, a senior editor at the New Republic and author of Big Girls Don't Cry: The Election That Changed Everything for American Women, about men calling her something other than her name, she responded: "Becky, Becky, Becky." Slate's Amanda Hess gets "Mandy". The Guardian's own Jill Filipovic told me, "Male commenters pretty regularly call me 'Jillly' when they're trying to be condescending."

Lauren Bruce, founder of Feministe, says, "I don't have a name that's easy to make a nickname from, so I got called 'Missy'. Like scolding a little girl." Feminist activist and writer Jamia Wilson agrees: "I hate 'Missy'."

Nicknames as insults are also standard for female politicians. Conservative blogs like Hot Air and WorldNetDaily, for example, have carried articles calling Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren "Lizzy", a swipe as irritating as it is incorrect – friends and family actually call Warren "Betsy" – and a search of "Hilly Clinton" brings you to the dregs of the misogynist internet (even worse: "silly Hilly").

Women have complicated relationships with what we're called. It was only in the 1970s that "Ms" – American women's first marriage-neutral honorific – became popularized. And despite feminist gains, less than than 20% of women keep their last names after marrying men. In fact, a 2009 study from Indiana University showed that 70% of Americans think women should take their husband's name and 50% believe it should be legally required.

Fifty years ago, Betty Friedan bemoaned a culture where women "answer the question 'who am I' by saying 'Tom's wife ... Mary's mother." What we're called matters; it's a central part of our identity and signals to the world who and what we are – self-determined individuals. So when men try to wrest control of that narrative and diminish it, it stings.

Now, on the scale of awful things men can call women, nicknames don't rank as horrifying as other put-downs. Harassment and violent rhetoric against women has become expected, especially online – and the threats so many of us face can be terrifying. (Consider the racist and misogynist free-for-all directed at pundit Zerlina Maxwell when she dared to suggest on Fox News that men should be taught not to rape.)

The good news is that no matter what they call women – bitch, slut or "Jessie" – name-calling is all sexists have in a debate. Calling us something other than what we are does not make us less right, and it won't make them more just. When misogynists resort to name-calling, they're labeling themselves more than they ever could disprove us.