Here’s what’s happening: All across the English-speaking world, men seeking or established in high office, icons of elitist entitlement shotgun-married to rank populism, are having to answer questions about just how much violence they have chosen to inflict on the women around them. And all across the English-speaking world, their supporters are rallying behind them.
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Male violence at the highest levels of government has been tolerated for a very long time. Unfortunately for these men, women are no longer quite so willing to keep their mouths shut about it as they once were. This means that even voters who don’t really care about male politicians assaulting women know that on some level they should care, which is why so many double down on frantic excuses. Meanwhile, the accused themselves behave as though accountability is for the little people.
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Let’s be honest with ourselves for a second, here. Let’s admit that nobody votes for a Trump or a Johnson believing their candidate to be a sincere and morally upstanding specimen of humanity. All that is required from these spoiled thugs is all that has ever been required of them: the absolute bare minimum of plausible deniability, just enough of a flimsy fig leaf for browbeaten gatekeepers to feel OK about letting them off the hook, like they were always going to, whether the offense is a hilarious, totally innocuous—definitely not racist—crack about Africans or, you know, raping someone in a changing room.