And isn’t it pretty much a repeat? I thought I’ve seen pictures from 2016 when he’s done the same.
My sentiment exactly
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This a good example of Trumps intuitive ability to carefully calibrate provocations to things that will generate Light Outrage headlines which his supporters do not find outrageous. It’s an exploit of media production environment which allows infinite free advertising.
He campaigned very successfully on this in 2016, starting with packing his kickoff full of racist tropes but then pivots into targeted core messages. This is calibrated to activate the center left into media production with a message that will quietly please the right. Headlines for days. Earned Media, as they say.
My suggestion would be that writers (op-ed, blog, social) stop to consider if they are participating in the Light Outrage exploit. Notice if there is content to their post other than Light Outrage followed by core messages. “Consensual collarbone touched by leading candidate to cheering applause” fits.
A way out: Report information, not emotion, for candidates who thrive off the perpetual emotion exploit of Light Outrage.
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I grow tired of saying this, but TELL ME AGAIN THAT IT’S NOT A FUCKING CULT.
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That would be great, but we know it ain’t gonna happen. “Tromp’s Latest Trompiness” has been generating clicks for nearly a decade by now, and I can’t see any signs of that sickness slowing down any time soon.
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Oh, that’s just revolting.
#NeverVoteRepublican #TaxTheRich #TaxTheChurch
(I wish we could #TaxTheStupid - it would retire the nation’s debt FOREVER… )
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Meanwhile, this is happening:
This is beyond frustrating and I’ve been sitting here trying to respond, but nothing is normal anymore; I’m tired of it.
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I was about to say the same thing - while we don’t see the prelude to her having her back turned, she is quite clearly asking him for a signature on her chest. In all honesty, I’m pleasantly surprised that he not only signs her shirt rather than her chest, but doesn’t take the opportunity to grope her or do anything particularly disgusting. And judging by how the video starts + her reaction to him, I’m guessing she had her back turned for a photo or video. So, going off all there is in this video: this is indeed nothing. If anything, it shows Trump acting relatively reasonably. Heck, he’s more disgusting than this every time he talks to a microphone, let alone whenever he’s made a decision that actually affects other human beings.
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Case in point: the background audio which contains a fan bellowing “DONALD TRUMP I LOVE YOU”, mid signing.
Yes, presidents are regularly known for signing women’s tits, like some sort of fucking D-list celebrity… totally normal… /s
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… no, but then that’s exactly what Trump is, while the headline here makes this out to be far more than it is. Is it not the kind of behaviour you’d want from an ex-president? Sure. But that’s the current-day republican party - they’ve made politics into a mix of a conspiracy theory cult and a spectator sport, with the types of successful personalities and audience behaviour you’d expect from that. And with that as the background, this completely drowns in the noise of the actually bad things they do. Heck, this is the kind of stuff they love people getting triggered by because it’s such a nothingburger it legitimizes their rejection of their critics as snobbish and stuck-up. Resisting the shifting overton window is good, but only if you also avoid falling into the pitfalls of getting distracted by petty, meaningless nonsense.
He is also the former President of the US… so, no he’s not just a d-list celebrity… he basically controls one of our major political parties right now. He tried to overturn an election he lost. He and his backers in the party are fascists and fascists very much like to put out this kind of content, precisely for the message it sends - that he is popular with “the people” and women will degrade themselves for him, since he’s such a masculine figure…
Pointing out their shitty behavior, even this shit, matters. The dehumanization of women that this represents matters. Their leaning hard into the politics of empty tribalism matters. It ALL actually matters.
Maybe you can sit safe and judge the rest of us for not paying attention to what you believe are the “right” things to pay attention to, but as someone who has lost a fundamental right, I’m all for calling them out whenever they do this kind of shit that seems trivial. There are layers of meaning in this clip that we should notice and call out.
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And, think of all the truly terrible and dangerous things he did that were reported on and were treated like “light outrage” headlines by his followers anyway 
Aside from the misogyny and racist dog whistles on the campaign and beyond, him putting his family members and others who definitely never could’ve earned clearance and had zero qualifications into sensitive positions in the WH straightaway should have been a HUGE issue, but it just didn’t matter much to his party or supporters.
Same with the whole emoluments clause and his DC hotel, or bringing all the secret service agents to his resorts and making them pay for carts and rooms and green fees.
There are too many examples to name. The fact that he’s only (potentially) facing consequences for a handful of them kind of detracts from the whole, “don’t bother with the click bait light outrage headlines.”
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People have been complaining about the danger of getting distracted by the wrong things since before Trump was elected. I have never seen any evidence for it. From all I can tell, the people who care about things like this are the same people who care about his concentration camps and rogue judges.
And in service of this invented problem, the policing to make sure everyone is upset for the “right reasons” is exhausting. I took a couple years hiatus here because it was too much for me. Maybe…maybe just don’t. If people care that a former president is being a gross misogynist, it will be ok to let them.
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Well that’s a leap! Signing tits leads directly to genocide! That’s crazy talk! Not like the dehumanization of woman ever lead to bad shit… /s
If people can’t see how this behavior is deeply connected to the political world that Trump and his shitty band of fascists are hoping to impose on the rest of us, then perhaps they should go read up a bit more fascism as a historical phenomenon. People like Jason Stanley have been rather stridently and eloquently showing how this all works… the culture wars are where fascism thrives, and so pointing out the cultural aspects of the MAGA movement matters here. It’s, in many ways, the linchpin of understanding how fascism gains traction. that’s the point - this sort of public showing of their values is directly tied to their fascist views… You can’t just ignore the parts that don’t seem relevant, because they are ALL relevant here.
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When you put it so plainly, I can now see it’s the finest of grifts. I just can’t not admire it.
It’s up there with buying baking soda (or is it powder?) to throw down the drain. Or mix it into kitty litter.
Baking soda, I think, is the one you’re thinking of, but I’m not quite getting the analogy.
I don’t see the connection between that marketing and how TFG got away with blatantly and openly flouting the constitution and none of his supporters seemed to care…can you clarify?
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“When you’re a star, they let you do it.”
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More like: When you’re a man with wealth, you can “do it” with no real consequence…
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I think you’re misunderstanding what I’m saying here. I’m very much in favor of caring about Trump being a gross misogynist - I’m just saying that when trying to bring attention to that, we should use actually good examples of this. What Ithis video show is at worst some very basic iffy behaviour that absolutely reaches the bar of “not the dignified behaviour that I’d expect or want from a previous president” - but on that scale it’s also about as low as it gets. There’s nothing non-consensual going on, nothing overtly gross, no groping or inappropriate touching or actually lewd behaviour. As I said, watching the video I was more surprised by what he didn’t do than what he did. This isn’t Rudy Giuliani sticking his hands down his pants on camera. This isn’t Lauren Boebert groping her date’s groin in a public theatre. It’s a sleazy and desperately insecure D-list celeb-cum-ex-president stirring up his cult and signing a shirt. Yes, that shirt is being worn by a person, and the place signed is on her chest, but the only way that would show him being a gross misogynist is if he abused the signing for something lewd.
Nothing in this video actually shows Trump being a gross misogynist. It shows him being a self-centered, attention-loving, broadly/unspecifically creepy old guy. We know he’s a gross misogynist and can read that into this interaction because of all the other stuff we have seen or heard him do (or heard of him doing), but without that foreknowledge, this video shows a relatively innocent interaction when it comes to sexism.
@anon61221983 I absolutely agree that this is deeply connected to the political world that Trump and his fellow fascists are hoping to impose on the US. But, again, if that’s the focus then the cult-like behaviour and cult of personality are the parts worth discussing here, no? Sure, signing a shirt is silly celebrity behaviour rather than what any reasonable politician would be doing, but then we need to be talking about that, not how bad it is that he signed her chest. And misogyny is absolutely a core aspect of fascism, but this video is a very poor example of any relevant structural or practical misogyny - it shows what is by all appearances an entirely consensual interaction that isn’t even remotely sexual or otherwise sexist by itself. And that’s my whole issue here - that focusing on this as a sexist interaction, especially with a headline as silly as “Lustful Donald Trump signs woman’s chest” takes away from any real focus on the cultural aspects of the MAGA movement. What this video could show of MAGA culture and the workings of contemporary hyper-populist fascism is entirely obfuscated by the angle of the OP forcing a perspective that the video barely supports at all.
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