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By David Futrelle
The Washington Post caused a bit of a stir on the internet today with an article by two academic researchers offering some rather intriguing evidence suggesting that many men turn to Trump because his blustery assertions of manhood help to reassure them about their own masculinity.
The researchers, Eric Knowles and Sarah DiMuccio at New York University, prove their point, at least in a rough way, by linking geographical patterns of Trump support with internet searches reflective of common male anxieties — from “hair loss,” and “how to get girls,” to “erectile dysfunction,” “penis enlargement,” “penis size,” and “Viagra.”
The researchers report “that support for Trump in the 2016 election was higher in areas that had more searches for topics such as ‘erectile dysfunction,'” even after controlling for an assortment of demographic factors.
In other words, male Trump supporters are more likely than male Trump opponents to be worried about their dicks. Literally and figuratively.
And this very much seems to be a Trump thing: The pattern didn’t hold for men who voted for John McCain in 2008 or Mitt Romney in 2012.
So do these sorts of internet searches really say anything about male fragility? Seems so. The researchers also conducted a survey of 300 men showing that interest in these sorts of subjects was indeed highest among men who
scor[ed] high on a questionnaire measuring “masculine gender-role discrepancy stress” — concern that they aren’t as manly as their male friends.
The researchers suggest, based on these findings, that “Trump appears to appeal” less to confidently masculine men than “to men who are secretly insecure about their manhood” and who take a certain vicarious pleasure in Trump’s macho posturings.
You can see this as well in the weird proliferation of “macho Trump” memes depicting the pudgy old dude as a musclebound he-man, as I pointed out in a post a couple of months ago.
Most of those reacting to the study on Twitter today tend to find it amusing, or obvious, or a mixture of the two. But Trump fans and Men’s Rights Activists (who are also mostly Trump fans) are crying foul.
In the Men’s Rights subreddit, the regulars are responding to the article with their typical reasoned, logical critiques — by which I mean insults and yelling from an assortment of people who clearly haven’t read what they’re yelling about.
“Hey Eric,” writes VoxVirilis, calling out one of the researchers by name.
It doesn’t matter how many feminist articles you write with Sarah, she isn’t going to sleep with you.
“Ah, projection,” writes boy_named_su
Men aren’t insecure about their penises, but women are about their vaginas, so they project
Men don’t vote for someone because they are insecure about some physical attribute, but I guess women must, so they project
Our old friend ThePigmanAgain has a somewhat confusing critique of the study’s methodology:
LOL! These are the same idiots who have a problem with Melania’s Christmas trees! No way am i bothering to read that crap.
Someone called paulkersey1999, meanwhile, goes with the classic No U response, declaring that “men who read the Washington post HAVE NO PENIS (or brain).”
I do so enjoy a spirited debate!
NOTE: Free internet points to anyone who can identify the song that inspired my photo caption above.
H/T to @DavidPeddicord on Twitter for pointing me to the WaPo piece!
That would be “Drug Store Truck Drivin’ Man’, by the Byrds, off 1969’s Dr. Byrds and Mr Hyde. When do I get my internet points? Can I spend them, anywhere?
Pajama Slave Dancers’ “Homo Truck Driving Man”?
It’s weird when you hear something that confirms something you didn’t even realize you already knew.
Well, now I know what PoxPuerilis is insecure about.
Sarah’s not sleeping with HIM, either!
So, I guess this guy whose dad named him “su” is also projecting, then. Because I’m certainly not insecure about my vagina, and neither is anyone else I know. But we all think Donnie Drumpf’s pussy-grabbing brag is (a) bullshit, and (b) super gross. Also (c) probably emblematic of quite a few insecurities about his own (cough) “mushroom”.
He looks so ridiculous at the wheel of that truck, like a cross between a pouty little kid and an extremely constipated elderly man who’s trying to take a dump.
I read that article earlier today. None of it surprised me. (I realize it’s merely showing a correIation.) I think the insecure macho types live vicariously through him. It’s second-hand wish fulfillment for them. They wish they could behave like a spoiled seven year old, disrespect people – especially women – and seemingly get away with it all.
The song in the caption…is it “Street Fighting Man” by the Rolling Stones?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nYfi7k9hOmc
lyrics in the details.
It probably doesn’t say much in my favor that the only song coming to my mind is ‘Truck-drivin’ Girl’ from Phineas and Ferb
song is obviously truck drivin man by Skynyrd.
though I’ve often thought these modern snowflakes probably more model themselves after Rush’s “workin man”
I admit to being a little bit suspicious of the Washington Post article. First of all, it’s one survey, correlation does not equal causation, and so on – all points the authors themselves acknowledge.
But that’s not my real issue. I’d be very interested in seeing a broader survey of negative search terms in conjunction with voting patterns. I suspect that what we’re seeing is simply that people who are angry and dissatisfied with their circumstances – for whatever reasons – are more likely to vote Trump. And, well, duh: the whole premise of Trump’s campaign was that everything was fucked, and he was going to fix it.
JD has it! The song was a dis on a DJ they didn’t like for (among other things) being a “drugstore truck driver,” sort of like a drugstore cowboy (a non-cowboy who wears a cowboy hat). Which kind of applies to Trump here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=piNF7LUehsM
More on the song in the comments here.
shall I quote you what’s going on, from the man who likely unintentionally started the GoP down the path of exploiting this to build a voter base to begin with?
“”If you can convince the lowest white man he’s better than the best colored man, he won’t notice you’re picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he’ll empty his pockets for you.”
-Lyndon B Johnson
Johnson grew up in the South; KNEW there were wayyyy too many people there already that his quote describes, and decried those who tried to exploit them.
so of course, after he left, that’s EXACTLY what the GoP did.
Fuck, Nixon even LABELLED it the “Southern Strategy”.
I rather call it, the Southern Tragedy.
150 years in the making, and still going strong.
I think that was some DJ that was dissing their somewhat radical shift to full-blown country with the Sweetheart of the Rodeo album, if my fragmented memory serves me well.
Here’s the story about the song I found:
“LOL! These are the same idiots who have a problem with Melania’s Christmas trees! No way am i bothering to read that crap.”
I get it, but just imagine if (say) Celine Dion had put those up. There’d be a wailing and a gnashing of teeth fit to split the heavens and calls for Holy War would arise tout de suite. We’d be asked repeatedly how much more proof we need that we’re at the mercy of forces beyond our ken. And so on and so on, ad infinitum. Just pointing it out.
Not at all surprised to hear there’s a correlation between Trump supporters and erectile difficulties, given the amount of time alt-right bozos spend complaining about how modern women don’t give them pants feels.
Equating masculinity with “ease of getting an erection” seems kind of problematic, though.
Okay, hilarious as these results are, I feel like they’re a little dubious.
https://twitter.com/BridgetPhetasy/status/1068219586254798848
Both of my friends are women, so I got it easy in the masculinity department.
heebee – On a quick glance, I can’t tell if that tweeter is being sarcastic or actually condoning ED shaming. I hereby denounce it as poorly worded sarcasm, at best.
I like that they think it was ever any kind of secret. Maybe from the guys themselves?
So, since they project everything, they think everyone project everything.
A new level of “it’s alway projection”, I guess.
I have not heard the Byrds version of “Drugstore Truck Driving Man”, but I have heard the version Joan Baez and Jeffrey Shurtleff do in Woodstock (which they dedicate to “the Governor of California… Ronald Reagan (he pronounces it as “ray gun”)….ZAP!)
That’s laugh out loud funny for me. Not because I’m happy that men are insecure about their penises – I don’t want any gender or group to have negative feelings about any part of their body.
It’s funny because anyone who has had sex with men or listened to them talk honestly knows that insecurity about their penises is almost a given. Women typically have many more body insecurities, of course, but it’s amazing to me that even an incel would deny this particular male anxiety.
☹
‘404 file not found’ when trying to read the WaPo piece.
****
Ichthyic:
Its more than 150 years strong. That was the underlying basis used in the creation of the Western notion of whiteness. That thought process that was at play bc the PTB in the 16th and 17th centuries wanted to prevent slaves and indentured servants of different backgrounds from joining forces. To ppl placate poor whites, they dangled some carrots in front of them. Told them they were better than Black slaves. Gave them a measure of power. Later, they also empowered them further by giving out rewards for the capture of runaway slaves.
(Recommended listening Scene On Radio podcast, “season 2”, Seeing White, a multi part series that examines race in the US through the lens of whiteness. Episode 2 covers the creation of race and whiteness in this country)
Oh, us men aren’t “insecure”. We just acknowledge the harsh reality of having a less than perfect penis.
[/manbrain]