Shit that Pissed me Off – 10/14
Last Friday, tape emerged in which Donald Trump said derogatory things about women and the Republican party lost it’s collective shit. Some of them think this is just the Democrats engaging in character assassination. Others, like Scott Baio, defended him by saying it wasn’t that bad and telling ladies that guys talk like this “all the time.”
OK, Scott. Two things.
One: No they don’t.
Two: It wouldn’t make it any better if they did.
Locker room talk – as Trump characterizes his comments – is a bullshit excuse. Not only is it something you don’t find in a lot of locker rooms (as Chris Kluwe so eloquently points out), I just don’t think Trump has been in enough locker rooms to know. It shouldn’t matter anyway because bragging about being able to sexually assault women shouldn’t happen anywhere.
But what truly upsets me is the shock some members of his party have expressed since the tape was released. Donald Trump has always struck me as a sleaze. It didn’t take a presidential campaign to convince me. Learning he said (and allegedly did) the sorts of things that a sleaze says (and does) only reinforced my opinion. I wasn’t surprised.
But I was disheartened that so many seemed shocked to learn that Donald Trump was precisely the person he has always presented himself to be.
Hi, I’m Donald Trump, and I’m going to tap this.
In retaliation, some supporters (and Trump himself) have pointed out that Bill Clinton is also a sleaze. And that may be true. It is also irrelevant.
Let’s think of it this way – Melania Trump was a nude model (and there is nothing wrong with that). Would it be fair to judge her husband for choices she made? I would assume most conservatives would say “no” and yet they have no issue judging Hillary Clinton for the actions of her husband.
Yes, Hillary has stood by her husband. It could be because she loves him. It could be for the sake of their daughter. It could be for political reasons. I don’t know. I do know that women stick by their cheating husbands all the time. Melania Trump does it and nobody seems to view that as an issue.
Finding out that Donald Trump treats women badly is as surprising as finding out that Superman can fly. We’ve all seen Superman fly. He does it all the time. We’ve all seen Donald Trump treat women like objects. He does it all the time.
Does Trump’s behavior make him unfit to serve as President? You bet it does. But his behavior isn’t new. We aren’t suddenly discovering the body of Jimmy Hoffa in Trump tower.
He was never fit to serve as President. He was always that guy.
Now I’m not going to blame Trump for this directly. Given all the stuff he has done and said, I think it is important that we blame this particular embarrassment on the people who support him.
As we have seen this week, Trump doesn’t appear to have a lot of respect for women. As one might expect, that disrespect is returned and the polls show that if women were voting, he’d lose bigger than he currently seems likely to lose.
The solution some Trump supporters have come up with is to repeal the 19th amendment.
I think they’re joking. But even if they are, what they are really saying is “look at these stupid women who don’t want to vote for a man who said he liked to sexually assault women. Maybe they shouldn’t have the right to vote.”
And it isn’t just men saying this. It is women.
It might not be that many but you can’t avoid the fact people are saying this shit. Rather than blaming Trump for his shortcomings, they blame women.
Which, I guess, is pretty much what women expect will happen in a situation like this. And that’s sad.
PS: A similar map showed that every state in the union would be blue if only black people voted. I’m curious to see how many Trump supporters would like to repeal the fifteenth amendment.
Anti Vaxx Group Funds Study That Finds No Link Between Vaccines and Autism
The fact the study found no link between vaccination and autism shouldn’t come as much of a surprise to most people since there is no link between vaccines and autism.
The anti-vaxx group that funded the study, though, it justifiably pissed that it failed to prove their point.
Oh, did I say “justifiably?” I meant to say “unreasonably.”
Because why the fuck would you be happy to learn that vaccines don’t cause autism? I mean, that means our kids won’t get mumps and we also have ruled out something as the cause of autism! I mean sure, we’ve ruled it out dozens of times before but now we have one more reason to vaccinate our kids.
You know – aside from the fact that vaccinations work
Well, it’s the same reason we always had – that vaccines don’t cause autism – but now we are even more sure!
So why would they be upset? Unless they are so completely fixated on the idea that vaccines cause autism that they would rather put the health of children at risk than accept that they are, in fact, dead wrong.
Nah! That can’t be it.
Plane Crew Needs a Doctor – as Long as the Doctor is a White Male
Tamika Cross is a black OB/GYN from Houston, Texas.
While on a flight home, a man experienced a medical emergency and she proceeded to offer assistance because she is, you know, a doctor. The fact she is black and a woman should not have been part of the equation.
And I’m certain that the flight crew who rudely rebuffed her offers to help and requested credentials never thought about the fact they were doing so because she was black and a woman. Even though a white male who said he was a doctor was not asked to show his credentials (at least not in front of Tamika).
And that’s the real issue – they never thought about it. When people of color talk about racism in this country, they aren’t talking about how all white people are burning crosses on their lawns.
They are talking about incidents like this. Incidents when someone sees the color of their skin and makes assumptions about their capabilities.
What should matter is that Tamika Cross is an OB/GYN and she was trying to help.
But that didn’t matter. Because flight attendants who would probably insist they “don’t see color” totally saw color.
Lou Dobbs Doxxes a Trump Accuser and Then he Gets Doxxed
Look, I have a simple rule when it comes to doxxing: Either it is always wrong or it is always OK. I tend to believe the former because the logic behind the latter doesn’t make sense.
Here’s how that goes: “That asshole Lou Dobbs retweeted the contact information for a woman who has accused Donald Trump of sexual assault. That’s a terrible thing to do to someone who had the courage to come forward after years of silence knowing full well she was going to be shit on by the Trump camp. Now she’s going to be be shit on by all sorts of people she doesn’t even know. That seems entirely wrong. Therefore, I will make sure Dobbs experiences the same thing!”
It’s like an endless string of bad decisions.
So you think doxxing is wrong but not wrong enough to do it yourself?
I can’t get on board with that. What happens if someone decides to retaliate by doxxing you? Is that OK or is it wrong again?
Now let’s get back to Dobbs because while I think doxxing him is shitty, what he did was worse because he is a public figure and his victim was not.
And yes, let’s be clear that releasing someone’s personal information (even if that information is public) is victimizing them. There is literally no other way to interpret the act. You aren’t putting someone’s information out there so everyone can send them a birthday card.
Dobbs didn’t do it first. Some nobody yahoo jackass did it first. All Dobbs did was lend his celebrity to that information so it would spread farther and faster. He sent his legions to bring down their outrage on the home of Jessica Leeds.
Donald Trump is attacking Leeds and other women who accuse him of sexual assault because that is the kind of man he is. It shouldn’t surprise any of us that Trump is a vindictive attack dog because he’s never presented himself as anything else. The rest of us, including Lou Dobbs, need to be better people than that.
Grail Diary 