Wednesday, April 27, 2016

Bully Boy, Puny Man

Trump’s sexism has always been blatant but yesterday he outdid himself in expressing his contempt for women. It was Trump, not Hillary, who introduced “the woman card” into the campaign. He did it in the way male sexists have always expressed their attitude of male superiority--women are deficient simply because they are not men. Like the flat-Earthers who believed Earth was the center of the universe and all celestial bodies revolved around it, Trump and other such males, believe they are the center of the social universe, entitled by birthright to measure females against the lie that devalues women. Sexist men are incapable of relating to women as full human beings. Their masculinity is so fragile that it depends on putting down women with insulting jokes and laws that restrict women's mobility and attempt to seize legislative control of women's bodies. Gender equality is not part of such men's world view. Trump has exposed his pitiful, deficient masculinity before, in comments meant to reassure his supporters about the size of his genitals. Thankfully, there are many more enlightened men out there who do not base their masculinity on the size of their penis or on bullying women. Trump's latest anti-woman statement takes even his campaign to a lower level: He said: “If Hillary Clinton were a man, I don’t think she’s get 5 percent of the vote.” Well, Donald, Hillary is not a man, and she's doing just fine on her own terms. The question you've raised, Donald, is what kind of man are you?