The confidence to contradict female (6)
I believe the answer is:
belief
'the confidence' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'contradict female' is the wordplay.
'contradict' becomes 'belie' ('belie' can be a synonym of 'contradict').
'female' becomes 'f' (abbreviation).
'belie'+'f'='BELIEF'
'to' is the link.
(Other definitions for belief that I've seen before include "Faith, doctrine" , "Religious conviction" , "Principle accepted without proof" , "Faith; confidence" , "Faith, credence" .)