When Donald Trump was elected, white men broke for him a percentage point more than they did for Mitt Romney. After that, in office breakrooms and at dinner parties, they sulked with self-righteous indignation, wronged as four-year olds. "Why didn't more black people vote? Why didn't more women vote for Hillary? We wouldn’t be in this mess!"*
When Mike Pence announced that women will be at a permanent professional disadvantage with him because he can't govern what happens below the end of his tie, men shrugged. Life's not fair. At least he has Mother to look out for him.
When Harvey Weinstein's repulsive and reprehensible acts against women came to light, men lit up Twitter with pulpit-thumping accusations. Why didn't these women- these cowards!- come forward earlier, throwing their own careers and reputations before the train so we could see the carnage? Where was Hillary's denunciation? How can Streep claim she didn't know? Why didn't the women DO SOMETHING ABOUT THAT MAN'S BEHAVIOR?!?!
We are not nannys, and we are definitely not priests. We are the whole people you denigrate and delegitimize every day for the color of our skin, the shape of our bodies, or any of the other outward appearances you think you’re entitled to approve or amend.
We live every day with the knowledge that we are one mistake from life-altering consequences, and we know you know that, too. And we know that some of you will use that like a coupon. Wore a skirt, had a drink, needed a ride, needed a job. So many discounts!
Donald Trump is the president because a large majority of white men chose him to do that job. Harvey Weinstein is a serial sexual harasser because that is a choice he made for himself, over and over again.
You want the control, but not the responsibility. Tough. Save yourselves or go to hell. Your absolution is not in our purse.
*Clinton won women by 12 points, though among white women, only college-educated women broke for her, overturning years of voting R. Black people were strategically and systematically driven from the polls by rules and closings designed by white men to disenfranchise them.
http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/11/09/behind-trumps-victory-divisions-by-race-gender-education/
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/clinton-couldnt-win-over-white-women/
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/11/north-carolina-gop-brags-about-how-few-black-people-were-able-vote-early/
https://www.brennancenter.org/analysis/election-2016-restrictive-voting-laws-numbers