Donald Trump, "protector" of women: This deeply sexist notion has a long legal history

Donald Trump, "protector" of women: This deeply sexist notion has a long legal history
Trump's version of insecure masculinity demands a weak, submissive woman, who must be protected — and controlled

By Jacqueline Beatty
Professor of history, York College
Published October 13, 2024 9:00AM (EDT)


“I am your protector,” Donald Trump declared to women voters at a Sept. 23 rally in western Pennsylvania. “You will no longer be abandoned, lonely or scared. You will no longer be in danger. … You will be protected and I will be your protector.” Clips of this moment went viral on social media, and cable news hosts laughed derisively. As a historian of early American women and gender, however, I saw the deep and troubling roots of this rhetoric.

As polls increasingly find a widening gender gap between Trump and Kamala Harris among women voters, his campaign has made overt appeals to white suburban women.

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At the same Pennsylvania rally, Trump claimed that his second term would offer protection for women “at the border, on the sidewalks of your now violent cities, in the suburbs where you are under migrant criminal siege, and with our military protecting you from foreign enemies.” He invoked an insecure masculinity rooted in the use of violence against real or often perceived threats, which requires a submissive, helpless, vulnerable woman to protect in order to validate its existence. In other words, to legitimate this brand of manhood, there must be a woman (or women) to protect. It’s a gendered performance that women of our historical moment, and of centuries past, know well.

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The protection of women — purportedly a benevolent, paternalistic gesture — has instead been historically grounded in and applied for the purposes of controlling women. In many cases throughout American history, it has been those tasked with the protection of women who have violated their safety, health and well-being. While husbands were charged with the protection of their wives under coverture, early American law and society justified the use of violence by husbands against wives, as a “moderate correction,” to enforce women’s submission and obedience. ...................(more)

https://www.salon.com/2024/10/13/donald-trump-protector-of-women-this-deeply-sexist-notion-has-a-long-legal-history/