The Republican Platform says a lot about Republican Man. He’s a strange one...
Leonardo da Vinci’s arguably most famous drawing is called the Vitruvian Man. You’ve seen it; it’s the one where a buff man is stretching out in two positions inside a circle. Also called The Proportions of Man, it got us thinking about what a Vitruvian Republican might look like. What are his “proportions?”
The Republican Party’s latest draft platform was completed this week, just in time for next week’s Tampa convention. It gives us a pretty good idea of what Republican Man looks like. According to the platform, who is a Republican voter voting to elect?
1. A manly man – Nowhere in contemporary America is the biblical interpretation of woman – “of man” – so apparent than in today’s RNC leadership. “Of man” is the dominant theme of the platform’s treatment of women, endorsing rules, laws and beliefs that subjugate women to the views of religious institutions. Notably, the platform elevates the rights of zygotes above the rights of women who may have one inside of them.
It’s a public policy that could only have been imagined by men. The platform also prescribes that women – and young girls – must give birth to a child conceived when they were raped by a stranger, or an uncle, or a drunken father. Hey, nothing is manlier than just taking what you want from a woman right?
Real men don’t ask. They just threaten you, so that you don’t tell...
2. A cruel master – If that zygote turns into a blastocyst, then an embryo, then a fetus, and finally a baby, then Republican Man insists that it must suffer all the cruel fates of being raised by a mother who doesn’t want or can’t care for it. Or who – through no fault of her own – is retraumatized by the reminder of the cruel, violent rape that created it, perhaps making her unable to be a good mom or even a sane one.
A child who is poor, hungry, unloved and perhaps riddled with broken chromosomes is expected to buck up, grow up and toil his or her entire life to earn a way into the lower middle class. Republican Man thinks he or she should be grateful, too, and that the kid could have been rich if only he’d tried harder.
Interestingly, these are views shared equally by Republican Man Governor Bob McDonnell, Republican Man Congressman Todd Aikens and Republican Man Candidate Paul Ryan. (Really, who can guess what Republican Man Mitt Romney actually thinks?)
Republican Man also believes that the rapist, uncle, or drunken father should have custody rights too, because, hey, every child should have two parents, a rapist and his victim.
3. A big, strapping boy who can take any girl in a fight – Ignoring all evidence over the past two decades, Republican Man believes that any time a close combat job is given to a woman military readiness is compromised. This is, of course, the same idea that has been thoroughly debunked by women in our services and just like the claims that have been made about black men and gay men.
Still Republican Man has created a rich fantasy world in which he imagines he could beat any woman he competes with. In his world, he’s not ducking fair competition, he’s being brave. Such is the last gasp of a silly rationalization.
4. A man who doesn’t want anyone to know about condoms – Republican Man is against any sex education that includes information about about sex, including both how to do it and how to prevent pregnancy. His goal, perhaps, is to make sure you enter your sexually active years not knowing what you’re missing – just in case he can’t deliver the O.
The no birth control part remains baffling. Apparently Republican Man also wants to sire as many children as he possibly can, something he routinely condemns urban poor people for. (They’re black you know, so they are lacking in good character. That’s why Republican Man doesn’t want them to vote either.)
At the very least, you’d think he’s want those inner city people to know something about birth control, but apparently he fears that his own conquests might stumble upon some sex knowledge if it is released into the wild.
The platform contains a ton of other offensive propositions including reduced rights for gay Americans and gay service members, über alles state’s rights for everyone except those Americans who live in Washington DC (who instead get guns shoved down their throats,) and rolling back Federal intervention in state-sponsored racism. It also calls for Arizona-style immigration laws so that states can binge and purge on the unprotected workforce however they want.
So take a look at your dating site profile, ladies. Is this the kind of man you signed up for? If you wouldn’t date this kind of jerk, you really shouldn’t unleash him on the rest of the country either. It’s that simple.