Posturing is to politics as chocolate is to being delicious, but much like with sweet chocolatey goodness, eventually enough is enough--or, you know, maybe not. As Americans, we have the privilege in this election cycle of having so many candidates who are chomping at the bit to show us just who is the most manly and masculine man--and sometimes woman. Now of course, this is nothing new to American politics, but the race for the Republican Party nomination may have gone above and beyond the call of duty. To paraphrase modern-day philosopher and all-around good guy Spongebob Squarepants, "This isn't your average everyday masculinity, this is...advanced masculinity."
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2016/03/21/donald-trump-my-hands-are-normal-hands/
What you see here are two short video clips, the first being taken from a speech by former presidential hopeful Marco Rubio, followed by a clip from presumed Republican nominee Donald Trump. In these clips, you'll see that these two fine gentlemen focus on the real problems this country is facing, the hard-hitting issues that make this election so crucial--the size of their hands. Also referenced are things like, "Who's the tallest," "How far can I hit a golf ball," and, "Make America orange again!" Okay, so maybe that last one isn't entirely true, but there definitely was a reference to how orange Donald Trump's skin is. Now, I'm not saying that Trump's skin is orange, but even the state of Florida was like, "Damn, that's pretty orange."
Now again, this attempted emasculation of candidates is nothing new in the political space. As Cunningham et. al tell us in their article Accruing Masculinity Capital, both Democrats and Republicans aren't shy to attack one another on bases other than the issues that most intelligent voters would be interested in hearing about. During the 2004 election run, Cunningham (et. al, can't forget those guys) looked at how Republicans and Democrats talked about themselves and each other, and their findings are more or less what one might come to expect, if thinking in terms of liberals versus conservatives.
Democrats had a tendency to refer to George W. Bush--then on his way to a second presidential term--as a, "war president," which is a really polite way to say, "war monger." Republicans on the other hand would refer to their left-wing opponents as being interested in fighting a more, "sensitive war on terror." Both of these statements are emasculating for different reasons; referring to Dubya as a war monger is akin to dehumanizing him, taking what would otherwise potentially be considered as a positive masculine trait--a fighting mentality--and turning him into a monster of sorts, though again in nicer words. And of course, saying that the Democrats want to fight a sensitive war, with speakers as notable as the former Governator of California going so far as to call them, "girlie men," well, maybe subtelty isn't their strong suit.
Today's Republicans are more than a stone's throw from the Republicans of only twelve years ago when it comes to the masculine posturing. Remember those commercials for Nerf footballs from the 1990's where the NFL quarterback throws the ball an entire field length or more? I'd say that these modern-day candidates--Rubio, Trump, et. al--took not only a page from their forebearers, but decided to write a whole damn book. Certainly this makes for more interesting television, as this campaign cycle seems to be more a game of, "he said, she said," rather than emphasis on the issues. In the modern-day classic movie Tropic Thunder, when speaking on the topic of committing to a role, Robert Downey Jr.'s character--who himself was a dude, playing a dude, disguised as another dude--said that you should never go full retard. Well, consider this then a message to Donald Trump and the Republican Party at large: you've gone full retard.
-Al Blum
