On Wearing the Zeitgeist’s Demento-Hat

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Everybody is making a big deal out of the fact that Hillary, if elected, would be the first woman president. Have we not grown beyond this yet? It is evident on the face of it that, if elected, she would only be the first known woman president. What matters is self-identification, right? And out of the forty plus (presumed) males that have been elected to the presidency thus far—all during times of darkness, bigotry, and hate—how many of them had private womanly yearnings? The question answers itself, and the answer is multitudes. How many retired to the Executive Residence at night, sobbing, wishing that they could make their true identity known to that vast crowd of benighted American yahoos? I mean, how much do we really know about Rutherford B. Hayes?obama-pitch

No, no, the chances are pretty good that Hillary wouldn’t be the first woman president at all. Intellectual honesty prevents us conceding that to her. The science is settled.

And besides, we can’t actually vote for anything on that basis. The real reason for the deleted emails—I mean, think this through—is that she is prepping for a transition. One of the things we have been learning recently—has ever an age seen the scientific and philosophical breakthroughs that we have?—is that gender fluidity is hot and really fluid, almost a steam really, more fluid than a politician’s promises, and should therefore be cataloged right alongside those promises.

Hillary, if elected, will no doubt announce to a disappointed feminine constituency, that she was not planning on being the first woman president at all. She would transition—I believe the preferred term is “pivot”—some time before the inauguration.

Not only would such a move have the advantage of helping us come to grips with our deep-seated antipathies toward trans-presidents, it would also make Bill Clinton the first openly gay presidential spouse, and serve him right too.

Somber afterthought: Some may have detected that I was having a little bit of what bigoted people call “fun” in the paragraphs above. Nothing like borrowing the zeitgeist’s demento-hat and dancing around a bit to make the bells jingle. But here. I now give the hat back to you—our over-educated overlords—and the bells on there really are yours. You manufactured them. You sewed them on. You really are doing this same kind of thing, every day, across the country, especially at the colleges where all the smart stupid kids go, and you do all of it in manifold and manifest ways.

And I don’t know why anyone hasn’t point this out before, but all of it is really stupid.

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Austin C. Brown
Austin C. Brown
7 years ago

Shoot, maybe Hillary is really a man… that might explain all the pant suits…

Dunsworth
Dunsworth
7 years ago

I’ve never seen a man in a pantsuit. ;-)

Capndweeb
Capndweeb
7 years ago
Reply to  Dunsworth

Madam Dunsworth, with the greatest respect possible, I would like to direct your attention to Kim Jung Un–who bears an uncanny similarity to Ms. Hillary in so many ways.

Dunsworth
Dunsworth
7 years ago
Reply to  Capndweeb

Well, I grant you that, but I was assuming an American, or at least western, man. :-)

Further, there is the open question of how well KJU exemplifies manhood.

jillybean
jillybean
7 years ago
Reply to  Dunsworth

Not just manhood, but human personhood in general. If his parents were the foulest satyr imaginable and the queen of the gorgon reptiles, it would explain a lot.

Dunsworth
Dunsworth
7 years ago
Reply to  jillybean

True, but there are more masculine forms of evil inhuman dictator, a la Saddam or Khaddafi. KJU is just a mushy little toad with enough power to torture those who don’t please him.

Although, in general I object to criticism that takes the form of “inhuman”; in the nature of things wickedness is all too human, sadly. But I take your point.

jillybean
jillybean
7 years ago
Reply to  Dunsworth

I think you were too young to have seen the men’s leisure suits of the early 1970s. Made of pastel polyester, they were pretty close.

Capndweeb
Capndweeb
7 years ago
Reply to  jillybean

Jilly, a bit of trivia for you: At one time, the price of automotive anti-freeze endured a sudden spike because of the popularity of said leisure suits, which used the same chemicals in their manufacture.

jillybean
jillybean
7 years ago
Reply to  Capndweeb

That is amazing. I thought they were seriously terrible looking, especially worn in conjunction with a gold chain and a horoscope charm glimpsed under buttons that should have been done up! No that my hipster bellbottoms and Ren Fayre dresses were any better!

Does antifreeze work in Minnesota or do you have to plug in? Where I lived in the frozen North, there were plug ins in front of every business. It always kind of reminding me of tethering one’s horse before heading for the saloon.

Capndweeb
Capndweeb
7 years ago
Reply to  jillybean

Yes, antifreeze has always kept the coolant from freezing. (Well, in the very early days of automobiles, they used alcohol to prevent the coolant from freezing, but modern ethylene glycol-based antifreeze became common shortly after WWII.) Here in Minnesota, it’s commonly mixed to prevent freezing down to -40F. The plug-ins were so the cars would start. When I was a young man, people would brag when their cars would actually start at -20. Modern cars with electronic fuel injection don’t need to be plugged in, although some still do to minimize wear and get heat into the car a little… Read more »

Dunsworth
Dunsworth
7 years ago
Reply to  jillybean

OTOH, when watching a 70s era sleuth or cop show, shirts unbuttoned to the navel were a great marker for the guy who may not have been the central perp, but at least was in it up to his eyeballs.

jillybean
jillybean
7 years ago
Reply to  Dunsworth

Oh yes! You could be sure he was trafficking in girls or cocaine.

Dunsworth
Dunsworth
7 years ago
Reply to  jillybean

Or sucking up to some poor little rich girl with Daddy issues.

Capndweeb
Capndweeb
7 years ago
Reply to  Dunsworth

And the perp was always so hairy that I constantly wondered if or when the gold chain would become snagged in it.

jillybean
jillybean
7 years ago
Reply to  Capndweeb

Whatever he ate for breakfast became encrusted in it. Yuck, TMI.

Dunsworth
Dunsworth
7 years ago
Reply to  jillybean

No, I saw them. I guess you’re right. But then again, I was assuming the current context. This lacks less punch than my original statement but still, I think, makes the point: in this time and culture, men typically don’t wear pantsuits and those that do tend to have their masculinity called into question thereby. So I don’t think there’s a good link between “Hillary is a man” and “Hillary wears pantsuits.”

And no, I’m not taking Capndweeb’s comment too seriously because I’m just having fun with it in return. :-)

jillybean
jillybean
7 years ago
Reply to  Dunsworth

I know none of this is meant to be taken seriously. But, all the same, I don’t see Hillary as masculine in the least. I see her as female in a particular sense to which many of us, both men and women, react badly. She strikes me as critical, censoring, untender know-it-all Mommie who wants to get us all marching in lockstep. Mommie the scold, Mommie the killjoy. I think men could add their two-cents to that image, but it would be indelicate for me to say more about that!

Capndweeb
Capndweeb
7 years ago
Reply to  jillybean

Interesting Jilly. Yes, she does have a “Mommy Dearest” quality–including what appears to be a very deep, very troubling psychosis.
NO WIRE HANGERS!!

Capndweeb
Capndweeb
7 years ago
Reply to  Capndweeb

Evvvvveeeeerrrr!!!

JohnM
JohnM
7 years ago
Reply to  jillybean

“Mommie the scold, Mommie the killjoy.”
Isn’t that the job description? :)

Dunsworth
Dunsworth
7 years ago
Reply to  jillybean

Actually, I agree with that. I don’t view Hillary as masculine at all, either. She is femininity in its ugly form, as you say. (Not referring to her physical appearance — I’ve always thought she was a reasonably good-looking woman in bone structure at least, though her habitual expressions tend to detract.)

JohnM
JohnM
7 years ago
Reply to  Dunsworth

“…those that do tend to have their masculinity called into question thereby”

But surely not for much longer? Questioning masculinity only makes sense if masculine is something distinct from any other possibility.

Bro. Steve
Bro. Steve
7 years ago
Reply to  Dunsworth

You have never seen the BeeGees, have you?

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/494833077778089314/

Capndweeb
Capndweeb
7 years ago
Reply to  Bro. Steve

Remember that noise Lurch used to make on the Addams Family?

I just made that noise.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xCc-RWIp7XU

JL
JL
7 years ago
Reply to  Bro. Steve

You dare mock the BeeGees?

When I first heard this I remember that my mood ring turned all the colors of the rainbow.

Well, you can tell by the way I use my walk
I’m a woman’s man: no time to talk
Music loud and women warm
I’ve been kicked around since I was born
And now it’s all right, it’s okay
And you may look the other way
We can try to understand
The New York Times’ effect on man

Christopher Casey
Christopher Casey
7 years ago
Reply to  JL

“You dare mock the BeeGees?”

You mean the all girl version of Abba? ;-)

JL
JL
7 years ago

Oh, the humanity.

jillybean
jillybean
7 years ago

(Correctly gauging the effect of his lese-majeste on the BeeGees’ outraged fans, CC takes refuge behind his keyboard..)

Christopher Casey
Christopher Casey
7 years ago
Reply to  jillybean

More like behind my wall of amplifiers…comment image

jillybean
jillybean
7 years ago

I have been wasting the last little while snickering myself silly at this list”

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0080339/trivia

"A" dad
"A" dad
7 years ago
Reply to  JL

Well, at least they are like the rest of us,
In that,
At some point,
They will stop “Stayin’ alive”!????

jillybean
jillybean
7 years ago
Reply to  "A" dad

As long as they don’t discover that “Nobody gets too much heaven no more…”

"A" dad
"A" dad
7 years ago
Reply to  jillybean

Stop!
(Please.. )
If you don’t, I will have no choice but to copy Mr. Burns,
…..and “release the mechanical Richard Simmons!”????

JL
JL
7 years ago
Reply to  "A" dad

That’s cruel, right there.

Dave
Dave
7 years ago
Reply to  jillybean

Jillybean, it’s because their knees are shot and they can’t climb the stairway to heaven.

jillybean
jillybean
7 years ago
Reply to  Dave

Their arthritic wrists don’t let them go knocking on heaven’s door.

jillybean
jillybean
7 years ago
Reply to  JL

You and me both, sister.

Andy
Andy
7 years ago

There is this photo of FDR…
comment image

Just saying…

Dunsworth
Dunsworth
7 years ago
Reply to  Andy

In my family there’s a picture of my paternal grandfather and his twin sister. Both are still toddlers so not yet “breeched,” but based on hairstyles and other things the casual observer would be certain that my grandfather was the girl and his sister the boy. They were about 10 years younger than FDR.

hillbillygeek
7 years ago

Heh.

jigawatt
jigawatt
7 years ago

I was at the 2009 All-Star game and I, unfortunately, saw that pitch.

jigawatt
jigawatt
7 years ago

Taking a cue from His Majesty, are you, Doug?

http://www.thecollegefix.com/post/29230/

Arwenb
Arwenb
7 years ago
Reply to  jigawatt

I, for one, applaud His majesty for his courage is coming out as trans-royal in a country like the United States, which has historically and institutionally oppressed anyone who does not conform to the cis-democratic-republican identitiy.

/prog /sarc

Capndweeb
Capndweeb
7 years ago

While many of you come here to read, I come here to learn to write. Thank you, Doug! Well done.

ME
ME
7 years ago
Reply to  Capndweeb

LOL, me too. Wilson is quite the wordsmith.

Bro. Steve
Bro. Steve
7 years ago

You bring up an interesting question:

Supposed Hillary self-identified herself tomorrow as a man.

Would the people supporting her because she’d be the first woman president go ahead and vote for her on something approximating that basis? Or would they be frustrated because their whole goal had just been snatched away?

If she got elected, would she be counted as the first woman president?

And I’m sorry to keep using “she.” Reality gets in the way of writing this.

JL
JL
7 years ago

Well, I know this. When Obamacare insists that all women have yearly gynecological exams things will get a bit, shall we say, hysterical.

jillybean
jillybean
7 years ago
Reply to  JL

At the 1976 Olympics, Princess Anne was the only woman excused from having a test to check that she was really female. I don’t know why I had to share this except that I have carried this factoid around in my head for 40 years.

JL
JL
7 years ago
Reply to  jillybean

I remember those games. My mom (Welsh) was so proud of Princess Anne.

I guess the Olympics will save a lot of money now on testing.

jillybean
jillybean
7 years ago
Reply to  JL

I had a Welsh great-grandmother whose last name was Jones. It was extremely difficult to track her down in the census!

JL
JL
7 years ago
Reply to  jillybean

We’re probably related then! My mom was also a Jones.

jillybean
jillybean
7 years ago
Reply to  JL

Where from in Wales?

JL
JL
7 years ago
Reply to  jillybean

North coast, not far from Conwy.

timothy
timothy
7 years ago

Well played.

Luke Pride
7 years ago

By their rules, calling her the first “women” would be ceding to the culturally defined idea of “gender” as set by biology.

Brian
Brian
7 years ago

I may be wrong, but is voting for Hillary because she’s a woman not every bit as sexist as not voting for her because she’s a woman?

ashv
ashv
7 years ago

This discussion is still stuck in the outmoded concept of the gender binary. We need to be inclusive towards people whose gender is “President of the United States”.