As long as "deplorable" is the word of the week, let's review all the misogyny that's spewed from chief Trump operatives over the years, starting with Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway herself. Conway once blamed the physical weakness of women for the existence of rape during a PBS panel she was on exploring gender equity and women in the military.
CONWAY: If we were physiologically — not mentally, emotionally, professionally — equal to men, if we were physiologically as strong as men, rape would not exist. You would be able to defend yourself and fight him off.
Hear that, ladies? Lift some weights! Oh and don't wear that sexy stuff. Or drink. Or put yourself in dangerous situations. Or walk alone. Or run in the park. Or forget your condoms*. (*Except you're a floozy if you buy condoms. That's a man's job.) Or get pregnant*. (*You shouldn't need condoms if you're wearing the right things and traveling in groups and otherwise staying off the streets, which are really a man's domain, just like the military. Let's face it, rape is your fault no matter what). Anyway, all of the above—unless you're looking to advance in the workplace. Then you better just drop all that weightlifting, says Conway.
“If women want to be taken seriously in the workforce, looking feminine is a good place to start.”
Hard to believe that Kellyanne's coaching failed to dissuade Donald Trump from reasserting just last week how "correct" this truly forward-thinking 2013 tweet was regarding women in the military:
What did they expect?! If only the ladies had been lifting more weights*! (*But not in the workforce, of course!)
Now, for some other lowlights from Trump's crew:
1) Remember that it's not rape if you're married, no matter what, says Trump’s lawyer, Michael Cohen, after Trump's former spouse said she sometimes felt "violated" by her husband.
"And, of course, understand that by the very definition, you can’t rape your spouse.”
“It is true,” Cohen added. “You cannot rape your spouse.”
2) Donald Trump’s vice presidential pick, Mike Pence, helped pioneer the GOP's obsession with shutting down Planned Parenthood and tried to redefine rape.
In Congress, Pence co-sponsored a bill that would have redefined rape and limited federal funding for abortion to women who suffered “forcible rape”—what [Todd] Akin famously described as “legitimate rape” when he doomed his 2012 Senate bill.
Remember, spousal rape is out! Also, see above for disqualifiers more generally: no sexy stuff (you’re asking for it), condom buying (you're asking for it), intoxicants (you're asking for it), solo excursions (you're asking for it), street strolling (you're asking for it), and lift those weights*! (*except if you're trying to be taken "seriously" in the workplace, then show a little something, if you know what we mean.)
3. Roger Ailes was helping all those women he sexually harassed, says Trump.
Then Trump started attacking the women who had come forward. “I can tell you that some of the women that are complaining, I know how much he's helped them," he said.
See, he's a helper! Good thing Trump scooped up Ailes as a chief debate coach.
4. Any woman who's being taken a little too "seriously" in the workplace and getting a little too much "help"—if you know what we mean—should really just find a "better alternative."
Donald Trump said Tuesday that women who are sexually harassed in the workplace can take action within their company, leave their employer while still seeking retribution, or quit.
“I think it’s got to be up to the individual,” Trump said in an interview. “It also depends on what’s available. There may be a better alternative; then there may not. If there’s not a better alternative, then you stay.
5. Also, ladies, if after taking all these preventative measures against rape and sexual harassment, you still fail to keep from getting preggers, not to worry! You might end up with a lot more time at home with the baby.
More than a decade ago, a female employee claimed that Stephen Bannon, now serving as Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump’s campaign CEO, disparaged her pregnancy, ignored her maternity leave, and then fired her while she was still out of the office, the New York Post first reported. [...]
In the complaint, Panely-Pacetti says she was a new mother and also suffered from multiple sclerosis (MS). She took maternity leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), which guarantees covered workers 12 weeks of unpaid time off for a new child or serious illness. However, she claims she was made to keep working while on leave with her new baby and was later fired.
Bannon's really got quite the history with women, both on the job and off.
Look, if ever there were three men who know how to treat a lady, it's the Trump-Ailes-Bannon triad. Fortunately, Kellyanne Conway is seated right beside them interjecting her special brand of "feminism" into the discourse.