Susanne Kaiser - Political Masculinity

During his presidency, Trump delivered what he had promised to his constituency – above all, to his supporters from the evangelical and alt-right milieus. The rights of political minorities, which had been arduously fought for over the course of decades, were scaled back during the four years of the Trump administration at a rate and to an extent that no one had thought possible before he entered office. Certain women’s rights – for instance, those concerning domestic violence or sexual assault – were set back around fifty years. 10The rights of LGBTQ+ people were drastically reduced, the official government use of terms such as ‘transgender’ was banned, and gender transitioning was criminalized. Funding for women’s health was blocked, and thus resources were lost to protect against such things as maternal mortality, genital mutilation or sexually transmitted diseases. Access to reproductive medicine was restricted, while obtaining abortions was made more difficult – and even impossible in certain states. That was one of the central campaign promises that Trump honoured during his time in office: by nominating Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett, three decidedly anti-abortion judges under the age of 55, to serve on the Supreme Court, he paved the way for decades of important legal battles in the United States.

These are just a few examples of the countless political measures employed by Trump to reduce the rights of women and other political minorities. It is no coincidence that the aim of such measures is to ensure that women are unable to make decisions about their own bodies. Reducing women to their bodies – and then regulating and controlling these same bodies – is a central element of authoritarian politics, and an expression of the patriarchal and misogynistic understanding of gender roles, an understanding that puts women in a subordinate position. Trump did damage to the American political system that will be felt for generations. The forces that he released will not disappear simply because he is no longer president. On the state level, the Republicans, as before, still hold clear majorities in the legislatures. In the general population, too, the Trump era will live on; the radical right, above all, remains just as mobilized. He ensured that American society will remain polarized on either side of the culture war, a divide that clearly deepened with his rhetoric and his politics.

The angry white men who benefited from Trump’s politics were already there before his presidency and they remain today – not only in the United States but in all Western countries. Evangelicals, right-wing extremists and masculinists, whose alliance Trump helped to form, have grown into a globally active authoritarian movement that will not go away any time soon, as this book will show. Instead, this movement will probably become even more dangerous for liberal Western democracies, as attested by the rise of right-wing terrorism in the United States and other Western countries such as Germany, Norway or New Zealand. The various ideological influences of this global masculinist, right-wing radical and fundamentalist community can sometimes come together like set pieces in a single person. This much is clear from the storming of the Capitol Building, whose participants stem primarily from the right-wing extremist milieu, but whose worldviews extend far beyond that.

One of these participants was Samuel Fisher, who, in the guise of a ‘misogynistic dating coach’ named Brad Holiday, sold tips on the internet for how to hit on women. By analysing Fisher’s online footprint, a reporter at the New York Times was able to trace every step of his radicalization. 11Fisher teaches young men ‘how to be a man’ and how to become pickup artists who are able to manipulate women for sex. He also sympathizes with the QAnon movement. His dating tips are infused with misogynistic, right-wing extremist and conspiratorial views. Fisher complains about his ex-wife and about the fact that he’s not allowed to see his daughter, thereby taking a position familiar from the men’s rights movement. He not only falls back on exaggerated stereotypes of women – he also presents himself as the victim of an advancing emancipation movement and, in response to this supposed threat, he bought a shotgun, machetes, tactical vests and more than a thousand rounds of ammunition. He travelled to the Trump rally in Washington, posted photographs of himself in front of the Capitol, and was later arrested and tried for his activities there.

So much of what has been brewing for years is embodied in the person of Fisher. There is a decidedly political current in which sexism has been radicalized and has taken on a political dimension. A comprehensive effort to explain why sexism and misogyny have become such important elements of the authoritarian backlash – an explanation that includes all the actors involved and examines their networking activity and reactionary collective potential – has yet to be undertaken. The present book seeks to explain, in gendered terms, the origins of this new predilection for authoritarians and the rise of the authoritarian right.

1 1. Madison Pauly, ‘The War on Masks is a Cover-Up for Toxic Masculinity: How Flouting Public Health Guidelines Became Synonymous with Manliness’, Mother Jones (8 October 2020), www.motherjones.com/coronavirus-updates/2020/10/trump-masks-covid-toxic-masculinity/?utm_source=facebook&utm_campaign=naytev&utm_medium=social.

2 2. Magazines, newspapers and news broadcasters such as the New York Times, the Guardian, Forbes, CNN – but also non-Western media outlets such as the Indian journal Yourstory – have lauded this ‘new leadership style’ as highly promising and future-oriented ‘in a new era of global threats’. The general conclusion is expressed neatly in the title of an article by Michelle P. King: ‘Women Are Better Leaders: The Pandemic Proves It’. See, for example, Avivah Wittenberg-Cox, ‘What Do Countries with the Best Coronavirus Responses Have in Common? Women Leaders’, Forbes (13 April 2020), www.forbes.com/sites/avivahwittenbergcox/2020/04/13/what-do-countries-with-the-best-coronavirus-reponses-have-in-common-women-leaders/?sh=6620923c3dec; Leta Hong Fincher, ‘Women Leaders Are Doing a Disproportionately Great Job at Handling the Pandemic: So Why Aren’t There More of Them?’ CNN.com (16 April 2020), www.cnn.com/2020/04/14/asia/women-government-leaders-coronavirus-hnk-intl/index.html; John Henley and Eleanor Ainge Roy, ‘Are Female Leaders More Successful at Managing the Coronavirus Crisis?’ The Guardian (25 April 2020), www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/25/why-do-female-leaders-seem-to-be-more-successful-at-managing-the-coronavirus-crisis; Amanda Taub, ‘Why Are Women-Led Nations Doing Better with Covid-19?’ New York Times (18 May 2020), www.nytimes.com/2020/05/15/world/coronavirus-women-leaders.html; and Nirandhi Gowthaman, ‘Coronavirus: How Have Women-Led Countries Flattened the Curve?’ Yourstory (17 April 2020), https://yourstory.com/herstory/2020/04/coronavirus-women-led-countries-flattened-curve. For King’s article, see CNN.com (5 May 2020), www.cnn.com/2020/05/05/perspectives/women-leaders-coronavirus/index.html.

3 3. Gemma D’Auria and Aaron De Smet, ‘Leadership in a Crisis: Responding to the Coronavirus Outbreak and Future Challenges’, McKinsey & Company (16 March 2020), www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/organization/our-insights/leadership-in-a-crisis-responding-to-the-coronavirus-outbreak-and-future-challenges#.

4 4. Haig’s post can be viewed online at www.instagram.com/p/B_NVSj5pv7R.

5 5. See, for example, ‘Weibliche Stimmen im Fußball: Hass gegen Kommentatorinnen macht Schule’, ntv.de (22 June 2018), www.n-tv.de/sport/fussball_wm_2018/Hass-gegen-Kommentatorinnen-macht-Schule-article20493382.html.