The Loathsome Language of Donald J. Trump
A sexual predator saying Kamala Harris "put out" on a national stage deserves total outrage, not a shrug.
It’s a grey day in D.C. as we prepare for another debate. This time, it’s the veep debate between Sen. JD Vance and Gov. Tim Walz. I’m hoping the debate will provide a bright spot amid the dreary cloud cover. By the time anyone reads this, we’ll know.
Whatever happens tonight, though, will likely be of less concern to me than one particular moment from the Sept. 10 debate between Donald J. Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris. It’s a line that’s been largely ignored but which sticks in my craw like an inflamed infection.
“She put out.”
As Trump blathered about Harris’s identity, as though his weird observations had some relevance to policy positions, that line just sort of popped out. My immediate reaction is preserved for posterity, thanks to Threads. (Because Xitter? Please. Gross.)
“SHE PUT OUT … Is that what I just heard?? o, you orange bastard 🤬🤬🤬 #LFG2024”
The next day, I expected to see many references to the “put out” line, even if to excuse it. I found scant little.
In this context, Trump running through Harris’s history, as he sees it from his grotesquely distorted perspective, there was no mistaking what he meant. He grabbed an old chestnut from the misogyny cupboard and tossed it onstage. The line was inexcusable.
An equivalent quip from Harris might have been, “I heard you’re a rapist.” Or, “They say you’ve stalked teen contestants in various stages of undress backstage at your beauty pageants.” Better yet, “People say to me, Ma’am, Mme. Vice President, he’s been impotent for a number of years.” Just telling you what I’ve heard.
Any one of those lines would have generated quite a bit of attention. But not, “She put out.” I had to go hunting. Where The Washington Post coverage I read seemed not to find this line newsworthy, at least some thoughtful and similarly offended commenters did.
Thank you, Satx61for this: “What about those 3 words ‘SHE PUT OUT’ …..?? Is everyone missing that is an old school sexist HORRIBLE statement about her and any woman that has risen in the working world!! WAPO please ask Trump about those 3 words!!”
Thanks as well to FallSpring for adding, in part, “The media silence about this comment was so deafening I had to go back and listen to that debate clip to make sure I had heard what I thought I had heard. I assumed that the radio silence about the offensive assertion was due to the media’s unspoken but universal desire not to give greater airtime to such an offensive, irrelevant, sexist comment. I understand that, but it is hard to imagine that a similar bullying claim directed to Mike Pence or any male politician would not have been promptly ruled out of order by debate moderators.”
Like FallSpring, I, too, have returned to that clip. (Thank you, C-SPAN!) Anyone might argue that Trump was merely stumbling on his words, that “She put out” should not be taken at face value. After nearly a decade of nonstop Trump headlines, we know who he is. To not take his offensive phrase at face value belies common sense.
Really, the misogyny is more in tune with the GOP brand than ever. Sure, there are plenty of women in the upper echelons of GOP power. But so was Phyllis Schlafly. With Trump at the top and Vance, who will forever be known for “childless cat ladies who are miserable,” at his side, it’s no wonder this race is shoving a huge wedge between women and men. That’s without even diving into the horrors of Trump’s band of Supreme Court crusaders overturning Roe.
In a recent 19th News/Survey Monkey poll, Harris had a 13-point lead over Trump among women voters. And that was even before their debate. Still, men prefer Trump. Dudes, what is wrong with you?
Like the women who support Trump, plenty of people would gladly vote against their best interests. Trump is backed by Vance’s patron, gay billionaire Peter Thiel. But Thiel could afford to live anywhere, so why should he care if marriage equality is threatened? Caitlyn Jenner certainly supported Trump once upon a time. Then didn’t, due to the Trump administration’s transphobia. But again does, due to candidate Trump’s transphobia.
Trump’s debate hate could have gotten under my skin simply because I’m a feminist. Radical? Hardly, unless believing in gender equality is somehow radical. “Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminist”? Absolutely not.
It might be Trump’s off-the-chart hypocrisy, however, that made me want to scream at the TV.
As a Gen X gay man, my sexual mores have always been suspect. Forced by society to examine them, to reflect upon them, to come to terms with what it meant to live outside of socially accepted gender norms, I came to celebrate my sexuality despite what was expected of me over the past few decades.
I looked at women as kindred. A victim of rape, for example, might easily be the crime’s suspect. What were you wearing? Did you mislead your attacker? When I was born, “marital rape” was legal nationwide. In patriarchal society, the fault lies with her. As a gay man whose orientation made him, too, second class, I could relate.
So, to have a straight man who is a globally notorious sexual predator speak to millions on live television and tell Harris, whose résumé includes prosecuting sexual predators, that she “put out” takes a level of gall that makes my head explode.
For the sake of our country, I can only hope that this election will once and for all take Trump’s political ambitions and have them metaphorically “put out” of our misery. It’s probably too much to hope that the bros mesmerized by Trump’s patriarchal piper’s tune will find better men to emulate. Should that, however, be the case for any of them, Walz strikes me as an outstanding choice.
Will O’Bryan is a former Metro Weekly managing editor, living in D.C. with his husband. He is online at www.LifeInFlights.com.
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