She's a young beautiful woman, never smiles. I never see a smile on her face. I see her standing there with hatred in her eyes, like she has hatred because we have borders, because we have a strong military, because we cut our taxes...
Donald Trump in a recent press conference.
Donald Trump is a creepy old man.
A few years ago there was a lot of ink spilled and electrons expended on whether or not there was a "crisis of masculinity" in American culture. There's still a fair amount of discussion of it, as evidenced by this New York Times op ed from this year:
A much-needed, nuanced conversation about masculinity and feminism today.
I've thought about posting in it from time to time, but never had as its a difficult topic to really address, even though, as it involves a shift in social standards, it fits right into this site's purpose.
Seeing Donald Trump insult of a female reporter the other day however, makes it impossible not to address.
Trump is a creepy old man who came of age in the 70s and had early sexual morals like that of an alley cat. He seems to lack any morals today. The comment he made was not only demeaning, it demonstrates an absolute contempt of women. The reporter is supposed to be a pretty adornment, in his view.
How many women have been confronted by the lech stating "why don't you smile more". Indeed, if you are of a certain age, "why don't you smile more?" or "why don't you wear prettier dresses" or the like is pretty much raising the flag of an intended sexual assault of the pressure type. Given Trump's dementia, it's not impossible to wonder if that was a line other women in other context have heard before.
It should have been met with a male reaction.
When I was young, even though I grew up in the 1960s and 70s, there was a set of expectations that boys learned and men followed. I think to some extent they've fallen aside as in the 1970s men lost track of what was expected of them due to the wave of First Generation Feminism. That era has passed, but knowing what to do and how to behave seems to have gone out to sea.
There exists in such a case a certain institution or law; let us say, for the sake of simplicity, a fence or gate erected across a road. The more modern type of reformer goes gaily up to it and says, “I don’t see the use of this; let us clear it away.” To which the more intelligent type of reformer will do well to answer: “If you don’t see the use of it, I certainly won’t let you clear it away. Go away and think. Then, when you can come back and tell me that you do see the use of it, I may allow you to destroy it."
Chesterton, The Thing.
The old standards weren't quaint, they existed for a reason. Two of the reasons are that men are more powerful than women and if the law of the jungle applies, lots of men will abuse women, and by abuse, you know what we mean. The vulnerable girls at Epstein Island, where Trump traveled with the other rich and often unprincipled, provide an example of that. Another reason is that the rules restrained men and oriented them towards decent behavior. Finally, and quite frankly, the rules in fact reflected centuries old views of the relationship between men and women, much of which underwent assault in the 1970s, but frankly which reflect women, and men, in their more natural roles.
Now, let's be clear. There were men who always violated these rules, some very openly, but they weren't admire for that. And the reaction to violation could go far beyond mere internal contempt.
Amongst the rules were some that seem pretty minor. You always opened the door for women, including women you didn't know. You walked around a car to let a woman out of the car and opened the door for her, and when entering a car you opened the door for her. Both of those actually reflect an era when doors were heavier, including car doors.
A man got up from his seat when women approached to address them, something depicted in the final seat of True Grit when Frank James does not get up when she approaches, and when she leaves she states "Keep your seat, trash".
That is how that was viewed.
More seriously, however, men, including teenage boys, were taught not to insult a woman's virtue in any fashion. The instruction was so serious that if you were in a relationship with a woman so insulted you were expected to immediately intervene, but it went beyond that. If you were in a setting where that was done you were also expected to intervene, particularly if you knew the girl or the knew somebody who was in a relationship with the girl. It was universally understood that a verbal rebuke of a person talking smack or insulting a girl, or saying the kind of thing Trump was saying, didn't cause them to knock it off, a fistfight was the probable result. Generally, the exchange went something like:
"Hey, knock it off and leave her alone."
The reply normally was:
"Hey dude, I didn't mean anything by it".
If,, however, the insulting person did not back off, a fight often ensued.
This is, of course, amongst younger men. If an older man, like Trump, said something like that, a verbal rebuke and walking out was the norma.
That went something like:
"You sir, are being insulting and owe her an apology".
With an old baffoon like Trump, that was normally met with:
"Um, I all I meant. . .
At which point the other men started leaving.
This is all 20th Century stuff, I'd note, and 20th Century middle class stuff. Even when I was young in rougher society fights could arise in this fashion which went right to knives. In European and European American middle class and upper class society of the 18th and 19th Century failing to yield often outright resulted in a duel.
Now, these guys just stand there like lumps, saying nothing.
One of the things about our current society is that it's really become White Trash. The gutter morals of men who view women as objects and who can't speak with any proficiency are dictating the culture of the country, and combined with this is the corruption that wealth has always brought about.
Again, Trump provides us a fine example of that. He's an immoral man who is steeped in immorality. He's hung around with the rich men who abuse teenage women to the point where questions about his behavior are legitimate questions. He's made creepy comments about his own daughter when she was young. The wheels are coming off of his ability to restrain himself. He gets closer and closer to the point at which he's going to outright proposition a woman on national television and not one male reporter has the courage to do anything about it.
But we're going to have to start doing something about this behavior.
Part of the claim of the MAGA movement and entities like the Wyoming Freedom Caucus is that they were restoring America. Instead, they're just White Trashing it up. Chuck Gray have us just such an example the other day when he acted like a 12 year old brat the Cowboy State Daily video program.
One of the things about the old rules is that even one person enforcing them was normally effective. Even within the last few years I've seen that when an official got mad about something and started swearing and another official rebuked him with "there are ladies here". I hadn't heard that in years, but it resulted in an immediate apology.
People around Trump need to start calling him on his behavior. People around Trump who pretend its not important need to be called on that. But beyond that, people in everyday conversation need to do the same. The long road back won't become from the top of the generation in charge. It'll have to come from the bottom.
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