Conservatives: Manliness and Fake Strength

Glenn Greenwald tackles issues of masculinity and politics:

On Thursday, The Wall St. Journal’s James Taranto — in an item he entitled “Always a Woman to Me” — followed in Ann Coulter’s footsteps by very cleverly noting that “at least one prominent feminist . . . has been won over by John Edwards’s womanly charms” (emphasis added).

…

In this case, Taranto was launching his fun femininity attacks on Edwards based on a New York Sun article that asked in its headlines: “Could Edwards Become First Woman President?”

This provides a different take on Coulter’s “faggot” comment.  It also plays into an oft-repeated meme.  Republicans are manly protectors who are capable of handling security and value personal responsibility.  Democrats are womanly creatures who like taxes, surrender, and long walks along the shore.

The essential idiocy of this argument isn’t lost on Glenn:

Taranto also takes particular glee in showing what a tough guy he is by mocking combat veterans like Max Cleland because — unlike the chest-beasting, super-brave Taranto — Cleland actually finds war to be trauamatizing and horrible.

Taranto and others like him (do you think they’ve purchased enlistment offsets?) may very well be doing this out of a deep seated psychological pathology.  What is clear is that the ideological need to subjugate others to attain power is essentially weakness.  It is weak to need to cause others pain and suffering to feel good about yourself.

There are a host of problems with equating weakness with the feminine.  The biggest of these is accuracy.  The overly muscled projected masculinity sold by the right is nothing more than a brittle shell.  This kind of “strength” can not stand up to a stress test.  It is a weakness we can exploit more often in debates.

It is also an ideological weak point.  As Glenn goes on to note in an update:

The official Richard Nixon library has recently posted on its site an article by the totally-fringe-and-unrepresentative- Ann-Coulter-whom-the-conservative-movement-repudiates.

…

Someone forgot to tell the Nixon Library that Ann Coulter has nothing to do with the conservative movement.

This kind of faux masculinity is really endemic to the radical right, and it is why they will continue to support Coulter and similar pundits.  This is even more troubling given her past remarks:

Why hasn’t the former spokesman for the Taliban matriculating at Yale been beaten even more senseless than he already is? According to Hollywood, this nation is a cauldron of ethnic hatreds positively brimming with violent skinheads. Where are the skinheads when you need them? What does a girl have to do to get an angry, club- and torch-wielding mob on its feet?

Let’s be clear here: Coulter is not “joking.” She is seriously calling for “manly” conservatives to inflict violence on a college student who is in the United States legally.

This “manly” posturing can lead directly to action and policy.  Where is the politician who will call this out for what it is, and offer the alternative?  The alternative has always existed, we just need someone to call attention to it.  It takes more strength, a deeper strength, to call for peace and compassion.