“I cherish women. I want to help women. I’m going to be able to do things for women that no other candidate would be able to do."
The above quote is, apparently, something Donald Trump said on CNN last year. Now, when Trump says he wants to do “things for women that no other candidate would be able to do,” he probably thought he meant he’d do something good for women, like combat sexism in the workplace or grapple with rape culture or help one play James Bond. Instead, however, the things Trump did for women no other candidate would be able to do actually consist of demeaning, belittling, harassing, lying about, horrifying, unnerving, disturbing, shaming, bullying, verbally abusing, haranguing, etc…
Donald Trump has a problem with women – well, Donald Trump has a lot of problems, problems that are tremendous and disastrous and “yuge” – and it’s affecting him bigly. His issues with women are far-reaching, disturbingly prominent, and well-documented. In fact, that doesn’t even scratch the surface; this recently-compiled video from “The Huffington Post” features many clips that hadn’t previously been reported. Point is: There are probably even more clips that are readily available of Trump being downright disgusting to women.
Now, you’re probably wondering: “Why are we talking about this again? Haven’t we already established Donald Trump is a rampant misogynist who, at best, views women as nothing more than sex objects and, at worst, views them as things that occasionally interrupt him?” Well, dear reader, we have already established this about Donald Trump. However, this is all rearing its ugly head again in light of fallout from Monday night’s first presidential debate between Trump and 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton. Clinton resurrected remarks Trump made about a former Miss Universe, Alicia Machado, who gained weight after having been crowned. This resurrection, evidently, did not sit well with Trump, and has become one of, if not the single, most discussed things from Monday’s debate (the only thing potentially beating it is the shimmy heard ‘round the world). Trump is unable to let this issue go, even incorporating it into a late-night tweet-storm. Two quick notes about this: Firstly, as has been expressed before, the angrier tweets from Trump’s account likely come from Trump himself as opposed to a staffer, so it’s highly likely that Trump was angrily tweeting from three to six in the morning like some white neckbearded male who hates the friend-zone, wears a fedora, and unironically calls women “m’lady”; secondly, Trump cites a supposed sex tape involving Machado, that no one has mentioned with the exception of him, as something to defame her character, but Trump had a very different reaction to Paris Hilton’s sex tape (I’ll save you a click: He’s a fan).
Here, I want to switch gears to this time four years ago. It was October, 2012. Jon Stewart was still regularly on air. People were excited to see “Skyfall.” Brangelina was still a thing. Barack Obama and then-Republican nominee Mitt Romney were taking part in a town hall before the upcoming election. Romney was asked a question about women in business, and he uttered his famous “binders full of women” gaffe. It was a huge and hilarious! There was a parody on Tumblr and another on Twitter. The group of people I watched the town with burst into laughter at the remark. The internet had a freaking field day with this comment. It was even a category on “Jeopardy!” for Pete’s sake! Even though there’s no evidence it costed Romney major votes or the election (in the vein of, say, an energetic rallying cry from short-lived Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean in 2004), it was a beautiful, wonderful moment where people from all walks of life came together to make fun of this guy who maybe earnestly but definitely awkwardly and painfully tried to not have a sausage-fest.
Four years ago, “binders full of women,” while not an election-costing gaffe, was a genuine gaffe, something for which a politician drew deserved flack that was, largely, harmless. Indicative of larger problems, certainly, but fairly harmless. But that was then, and Donald Trump is now. In four short years, the Republican Party went from a nominee who was like your endearingly awkward grandpa who’s aware that you’re a woman and tries to be nice about it but sometimes says something that comes out the wrong way to a nominee who was like your extremely creepy grandpa who makes really disturbing, harmful, offensive comments about the entire female gender along with saying that if you weren’t related perhaps he would be dating you. Four years is all it took for the Republicans to go from Mitt Romney to Donald Trump. Mitt Romney was far from a candidate I’d vote for (I'm a bleeding-heart liberal, by jove!), but at least he wasn’t the indescribably misogynistic jerk that Donald Trump is; I can't believe I'm saying it, but I genuinely miss Mitt Romney.
In short, how did this happen?
