Republished with permission from Florida Phoenix, by Diane Roberts

Women, too many women to shake a stick at: Michelle, Hillary, Elizabeth, Gretchen, Pink, Eva, Nancy, Mindy, Amy, Alexandria, Amanda, Jill, Oprah —

Freakin’ Oprah!

And, of course, Kamala.

In between the dancing and cheering, Sheila E. drumming, Stevie Wonder singing, and Patti LaBelle belting, you might have heard a high-pitched whining far off in the distance, the sound a dog makes when he’s frightened of a thunderstorm.

That was Donald Trump watching the Democratic National Convention, wheezing in impotent rage at those uppity, nasty women, and all those people determined to elect Kamala Harris.

The Party of Misogyny (you know them as Republicans) simply cannot process the possibility a woman, a chick, a human with a vajayjay! might become the most powerful person on the planet.

Much of their platform is desultory: making the rich richer, cozying up to dictators, and destroying the planet.

But they’re positively on fire when it comes to dragging women back to 1953.

Surely that was the Golden Age of Gender Relations.

J.D. Vance fan and New York Times columnist Ross Douthat says the 2024 election is “a referendum on masculinity in America.”

He’s annoyed at the lionization of men who are “unapologetically supportive of women’s rights,” especially Tim Walz and Doug Emhoff.

But wait! hollers Douthat—Emhoff had an affair a mere 14 years ago! So what if his ex has not only forgiven him but is working like mad to get Kamala Harris elected?

And what about horndog Bill Clinton—also forgiven by his wife?

Party of Misogyny

The implication seems to be these self-proclaimed feminist guys are no better, maybe even worse, than ratbags like Trump or Musk or awkward sticks like Vance who thinks post-menopausal women are only socially useful if they’re helping raise the children of young, fertile ladies.

Women ain’t buying it. Nor are they buying the Project 2025 view (in which Vance is heavily invested) that female bodies exist to pop out babies, so anything that empowers them to slip the leash and avoid their divinely mandated purpose must be outlawed.

When it comes to fetus versus fully grown woman, fetus wins every time.

The Party of Misogyny wants to limit access to contraception and they want no-fault divorce gone.

V.P. nominee Vance has even implied it might be better for women to stay in violent marriages for the sake of the children.

What’s a few broken bones and a concussion or three compared to preserving the sanctity of home and hearth?

The Palm Beach Pumpkin has been a misogynist longer than he’s been a Republican, an adjudicated rapist who doesn’t value a woman unless she is, as he says, “a young and beautiful piece of ass.”

Remember the 2016 campaign when he disparaged fellow candidate Carly Fiorina’s “horse face,” said debate moderator Megyn Kelly had “blood coming out of her wherever,” and boasted about grabbing women by the genitals?

Now he’s flinging insults at Kamala Harris like a monkey hurling poop at the bars of his cage. She’s “stupid,” she’s “weak,” she’s a communist, an antisemitic “lunatic,” unqualified—a “DEI hire”—and so clueless foreign leaders will treat her like a “play toy.”

And he’s sick of people talking about how attractive she is.

Not Leadership Material

When Time put a drawing of her on its Aug. 12 cover, he freaked out, accusing the magazine of making her look like Sophia Loren or Elizabeth Taylor or even “our great first lady Melania.”

(Note: Harris only resembles Loren, Taylor, or Melania Trump in that they’re all, you know, part of the vajayjay crowd).

But let’s not allow reality to get in the way of the crazy.

Trump’s spluttering, “I’m much better looking than her. Much better. Much better.”

For conservatives, the only masculinity they know is toxic masculinity.

Trump, Vance, and their manly man supporters assert, “When a man votes for a woman, he actually transitions into a woman.”

MAGA pin-up boy Andrew Tate, awaiting trial on charges of rape and human-trafficking, says, “If you want a woman to be president, you’re a homosexual.”

Tate, a British-American kickboxer whose one facial expression suggests he’s inserted a particularly tender appendage into a light socket, doesn’t think women should be able to vote.

In 2023, Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri, famous for running like a scalded polecat from Jan. 6 rioters, published a book called Manhood in which he exhorts men to be “kings, priests, fathers,” leaders of men—and of women.

Women are simply not leadership material.

New College Book Purge

Amy Reid, Yale Ph.D., a distinguished professor of Francophone Literature, has just resigned from the board of the Sarasota grift formerly known as New College of Florida.

She ran NCF’s well-regarded gender studies program—until it was shut down and its student-sponsored library shoveled into a dumpster.

NCF trustee and professional jerk Christopher Rufo, a guy convinced women in higher education cause “all sorts of cultural problems,” crowed, “We’ve hired the classicist Spencer Klavan to teach at New College of Florida. Goodbye gender studies; hello, Greek literature.”

Rufo, who thinks Greek lit. is super-manly, has failed to notice how much of it is about the slippery construction of masculine and feminine roles.

Gender studies actually helps illuminate The Iliad.

But we wouldn’t want to upset the baseball players.

Still, wait ’til Rufo finds out about all the homosexuality: Orestes and Pylades? Achilles and Patroclus? Sappho and her assorted girlfriends on Lesbos?

The Party of Misogyny is so shaky in its sense of masculinity, anything that could be remotely labeled as “feminine”—being proud of your family and expressing love—must be eradicated.

They Are Terrified

Gus Walz, the neurodivergent 17-year-old son of Tim and Gwen Walz, wept as he watched his father accept the nomination for V.P., and at one point cried out, “That’s my dad!”

The fine Christians of MAGA promptly took to social media, saying “Get that kid a tampon, already,” calling Gus a “blubbering bitch boy” and a “beta,” and comparing him unfavorably to Barron Trump, who apparently strikes the Right as a hyper-masculine teenage stud.

They attacked Ella Emhoff, a 25-year-old artist, model, and fashion designer. Seems her presentation of femininity did not meet with MAGA’s approval.

Some accused her of being a man; one called her “the nightmare scenario for most people with a daughter.”

Another genius posted: “Kamala Harris’ stepdaughter looks like she is ready to assassinate a former President tonight.”

The Harris family, the Emhoff family, and the Walz family embody an America beyond Trumpist white men’s understanding.

They are terrified.

It was bad enough when a Black man occupied the White House. Now they face the possibility that someone who’s Black and Asian and—great God Almighty!—a woman will sit behind the Resolute desk, wielding the power they think should belong only to them.

All I can say is, buckle up, boys: It’s going to be a bumpy ride.