This year has seriously been one full of surprises, most of them horrible and fatal. This year for America has brought to light some very serious issues that have been coursing through the veins of this country, mostly undetected by the mainstream media. However, with the way information is disseminated nowadays, it’s impossible for these problems to continue going unchecked in a vacuum. There has been an unprecedented conversation happening now about race relations and violence, the blistering effects of debt and rising tuition costs, and the exposure of rape culture and how it’s manifested in so many different daily occurrences.
The latter is my focus for today’s post, as I am simply at a loss that a “presidential” asshole hopeful who has unapologetically spewed hatred for the past year and a half STILL has this steadfast crazy base that is now defending his deplorable view of women. After the tape was released of him saying things that, let’s face it, aren’t all that staggering considering his track record. So okay, it’s not that his super fans are defending him, it’s that the women who are diehards seem to be unwavered by his words. This is so worrisome on so many levels. More specifically how he’s being defended and how he chose to defend himself by saying more or less everyone talks like that. “Locker room talk” is not an excuse for boasting about sexual assault. It has opened up this Pandora’s Box of how a part of this country responds to unacceptable treatment of women, because they feel this kind of talk is okay as long as it’s behind closed doors, in “locker rooms.”
Speaking with such gusto about that kind of disrespect is indicative of how you feel about women, it’s not a separate occurrence. There’s something so abhorrent about the idea it’s okay to objectify women as long as they don’t ever know about it. Also, the way republican men responded to the video, first mentioning that they all had mothers (DUH) and wives and daughters as if not having these women in your life would make you unable to understand the pure chauvinism in the words Trump used. Don’t get me started about Billy Bush’s cackling and him insisting on getting a hug from the celebrity woman they met off the bus. Freaking so disgusting. Gives me the creeps. It reminds me of those times when I’m at the bar and I overhear dudes talking amongst each other about women around them. They go over their “game plan” on how they’re going to get the girl to talk to them and it’s never with something simple, like saying freaking hi. It’s always something weird and creepy, like, “dude you bump into her…” like they’re the Harlem Globetrotters of hitting on women. It’s ridiculous.
The silver lining of this horrendous leak is the fact that we’re addressing the misogyny that has become all to familiar and normalized.
No more. It’s time to take responsibility for the way you talk about women, men. IT’S TIME.