Coming at it from another perspective, I personally have a rather old-fashioned conception of masculinity and I think there’s absolutely NOTHING about Trump that exemplifies it. He’s a whiny bitch. He constantly complains, publicly, about how unfairly he’s treated. He’s lived a pampered life and never taken any real, elemental risks - he’s not Howard Hughes, he’s not the kind of playboy who dabbled in motorsport or mountaineering or any of the things that I like to think I would do if I had the money he has. He’s a pussy. He’s always been one. And in previous eras where the majority of American males served in the military and grew up witnessing true hardship conditions - whatever their social class - he would never, EVER have been taken seriously as a candidate for any office, not even mayor.
I know there’s no going back to those days, and I know my attitude might be considered old-fashioned, which is why I basically keep it to myself and don’t have any problems with anyone like you who might see things differently. And Trump’s attitude towards women is certainly toxic, no argument there. But believe me, Trump is NOT a “man’s man.” I’m baffled by how many people he seems to have conned into thinking it.
Excellent post. I completely agree – he is incredibly whiny, continually demands special treatment, and hangs onto every perceived slight and grievance. He’s still pissed about being called a “short-fingered vulgarian” by Spy magazine, thirty years later.
‘The Buck Stops Here’, said by the Democratic President who won World War 2 by making a morally-divisive judgement to incinerate 200,000 Japanese citizens as to end a war which has already cost 55,000,000 lives, a judgement he owned from the moment he made it.
‘I Take No Responsibility At All’, said by the Republican President who surrendered World War COVID by refusing to make the easy judgements of following the scientists, wearing a mask, making PPE, and providing aid and comfort to the citizens who chose him to rule, these decisions costing the lives of 250,000 (and growing) Americans.
A 9/11 is occurring every day in this country and, given leadership comes from the top, the stark differences in our national responses reflects this too. No, nothing manly about Trump at all. Evil is more like it.
And his followers? 74,000,000 people voted for a COVID mitigation strategy… do nothing except watch people die… which would kill up to an additional 2,000,000 fellow citizens. Including myself, who tends to take this very personally.
Chris Hayes noted that the most attractive aspect of Christianity is the existence of Hell. And, honestly, I consider Trump’s followers… especially the ‘Christian’ followers… to be nothing more than apostates who have damned their souls to Hell.
Or Christianity is nothing but hoo-haw. And I’m fine with that conclusion.
But it has never really been inconsistent with a certain strain of “old-fashioned masculinity” for the “manly man” to whine and complain constantly about how unfairly he’s treated—to his inferiors. For wives, children, subordinates, the constant bitching and grumbling on the part of the “Boss” is just another way of expressing dominance. “You have to sit there and look sympathetic while I ramble on about how great I am and how much better I deserve than what I get.”
Yes, of course you’re right that a “manly man” doesn’t grumble and whine to his equals or superiors: his role is to take the psychological leadership of them by the exhibition of his masculine strength and courage and so on. But Trumpian kvetching is a way to sort of finesse his inadequacy by acting like everybody around him is an inferior.
Of course, to make that stick in any form whatsoever requires that Trump be unambiguously assigned the official starring role of leadership, whether that’s play-acting the ruthless boss on a reality-TV show or being POTUS or being the Dear Leader at a political rally of his followers. (Look how fast he leaves or ducks any situation where he’s not the official starring leader and would have to achieve a dominant role by actual force of character.)
But once he’s got that gold-plated TOP MAN label officially affixed to him, his bitching and whining about how unappreciated he is doesn’t affect his followers’ perception of his masculinity. Because he’s The Boss, and The Boss is allowed to boast and whine and talk about himself all the time, which just reinforces how subordinate you and your kind are. And since he’s The Boss, other “manly men” have to go through deferential protocols of subordination to him too, and his grumbling and complaining emphasizes their inferior status.
I know that’s not the way Trump’s behavior looks to you, but then you’re not a Trump supporter. From a Trump supporter’s perspective, there’s nothing “unmanly” about his whining.
You keep comparing Trump’s mishandling of the pandemic with the UK’s handling of the pandemic, and concluding he doesn’t come off too badly in comparison. I think you may be too close to the UK to understand how this comes across.
To an outsider - I’m Australian - this is like comparing the worst fuckup in the class to the second worst fuckup in the class and saying by comparison the former didn’t do too badly. Johnson’s handling of the pandemic has been utterly abysmal.
If their respective nations’ populations are a china shop and the pandemic response is a bulldozer, Trump’s handling of the bulldozer has involved him giving the china shop the finger and smashing into it at full speed. Johnson’s handling of the bulldozer is quite different. It’s like he’s blind drunk - he means well but just keeps grabbing the wrong lever and smashing forward then saying “Oh gosh, pardon me!” before clumsily grabbing reverse and smashing backward and saying “Dear me, everything will be fine, wot!”, just a moment before he announces he has a Grand Plan and will fix everything then accidentally turning hard left and taking out a few more shelves. And so on. And on.
I think I have something of an explanation for it. “You” (the generic) buy this nice car, and the repair bills gradually start to stack up. It sucks fuel like a BP exec’s wet dream and eats batteries like you would not believe. But it feels good to drive (when it runs) and it has extra cupholders. You forgive it its sins because you picked it out and you want to feel like you chose well.
The MAGAts complain about SJWs and Cancel Culture, and Individual-ONE supports their indignation, telling them they have a perfect right to their assholery and no one should be allowed to put them down for it. He impressed them by being a dick, and they took that to be a strong masculine trait, because they are like that and they want that to serve as validation (when, quite frankly, dickishness is the opposite of masculine). They bought that guy and though he spews dark clouds obvious bullshit, leaks classified info like a cracked block and whines like ten failing bearings, they ignore that because they want to feel good about their choice.
I think feeling good about their choice might be the reason some have stuck with him where they otherwise wouldn’t. But IMHO that’s only a partial explanation. There seem to be many who simply continue to think he’s a man’s man.
I think you hit on it best with your line “He impressed them by being a dick, and they took that to be a strong masculine trait…” Being a dick necessarily involves going against the grain and that shows a certain iconoclastic strength (or can appear that way even if really just a symptom of being a chaotic lunatic). However misapplied that strength may be.
It’s like that stage girls go through where they love the “bad boys” because they seem confident etc. Most then grow out of it. Some never do.
Plus the other big factor is that some (a lot of) people are just gullible as turkeys. They are simply easily fooled. Trump talks a big game and knows how to keep up appearances, and they simply don’t see through him.
He did acknowledge that he went into the dressing room of underage girls at the Teen USA pageant because he owned it and was allowed to. Maybe not molestation but certainly a crime for the ordinary person.
You’re OK with the rest of it though, right?
So he didn’t “molest” a child. Why does this nonsense keep getting repeated over and over? These ridiculous rape and molestation allegations were debunked years ago.
Wrong. He didn’t want the public alarmed against him. His methodology for his entire political career, first as a candidate and second as president, is to alarm the public against imaginary threats. When faced with a real threat that would cause him to lose public support, that’s when he began to care.