Editor,
The misogynist history of Donald Trump’s predatory mindset is nothing new and should not surprise anyone. The fact that it still does, speaks against the hypocritical self-conception of this country as a beacon of justice.
A quick glance at Trump’s trail of verbal abuse is indicative of even worse atrocities this man is accused of having committed during the course of his parasitic existence. So far, 16 women have come forth and accused him of sexual assault, including child rape. The media are conspicuously silent in their busy reporting of the newest allegations against a growing horde of national icons. When Trump, the accused, comes to the help of the accused U.S. Senate candidate from Alabama, Roy Moore, with the words, “He totally denies it” — as if this was enough to prove anything — he acts in self-defense.
After the first Republican presidential debate, Trump accused then Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly of menstruating bad words against him: “You can see there was blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her wherever.”
Last year Trump referred to 1996 Miss Universe winner and Venezuelan actress Alicia Machado as “Miss Housekeeping” who is a “fat” “Miss Piggy.” NYT columnist Gail Collins writes that Trump in fierce disagreement with a column she had authored in 2011 “sent me a copy of the column with my picture circled and ‘The Face of a Dog!’ written over it.” A bad temper unrestrained is bound to become violent.
One has to heed the words by American feminist Catherine MacKinnon who understands how words are never “only words.” Speech is a physical act with physical consequences, such as rape. The constitutional right to free speech cannot remain unrestrained without basic conditions set by civil and human rights. Trump’s comments are never meant to “mean” “just” what they say. They are designed to be demeaning to the point of denigration followed by destruction. The recent rise of deadly hate crimes in this country happens with Trump’s usurpation of the presidency.
Statements like the one made in 2006 when Trump called TV host Rosie O’Donnell “a disgusting slob” with a “fat, ugly face” in response to her criticism of his extramarital affairs to point out how ill-suited the man is for anything considered morally sound, must be seen in the pornographic context of America’s rape and war culture.
Here, another statement is revealing. When writer Natasha Stoynoff claimed in a 2016 report in People Magazine that she had been physically attacked by Trump while on assignment at Mar-A-Lago in 2005, the accused lashed out at a rally in Florida and said in an effort of self-defense, “the area was a public area, people all over the place...Take a look...Look at her...you tell me what you think. I don’t think so.” Apparently, he would never attack his object of desire in pubic, and more than ten years later, he considers Ms. Stoynoff too ugly to re-trigger the violent attack. Yet, his world-famous lewd words dating back to 2005, captured in the infamous video released by the Washington Post last year, brag about exactly this kind of predatory mindset.
As so often, Trump’s shameless insults drive home the point of his accusers. His talent for self-defensive self-incrimination is outstanding. His lies tell the truth. His denials admit his guilt. “Women are special,” he says, which in his mind means, they “are special prey for me(n).” Such hypocritical expertise can only flourish in a system that protects the bully. In a functioning democracy the vindictiveness of Trump’s self-indictments would throw him either in jail or out of the country.
We, however, live at the threshold to tyranny where, as Plato points out, “Horses and asses are let loose to run for office.” Consequently, at the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago American revolutionary Abbie Hoffman with his friend Jerry Rubin nominated Pigasus, the pig, for President, as the only sound alternative to war mongers like Nixon and Humphrey.
Today even his fellow-politicians refer to Trump as a “deranged animal.” As in George Orwell’s political tale, Animal Farm, it is unclear whether, in the end, we are witnessing the dealings of pigs or humans wreaking havoc in the White House and Congress as they preside over the deadly fate of the American people in their so-called “legislative” attempts to rob the poor, destroy the planet only to enrich themselves.
Whenever politicians disown the people they ought to represent, the people are called to disown and replace these politicians.
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Joachim L. Oberst
UNM Faculty
