Why I am unimpressed with the Women’s March

Having watched portions of the Women’s March on television and Internet, I remain unmoved by it. The leaders were vile and vulgar. Ashley Judd and Madonna particularly disgraced themselves. “Hanoi Jane” Fonda is never a welcomed sight and yet she was on the screen. All three women had their own scurrilous comments about President Trump. They were cheerleaders for the gathered throngs who predominantly seemed to share the same view and demeanor.

He Said, She Said

Many of the marchers wore the “P-word” hats, which are so ugly they defy explanation. Others had umbrellas colored like a woman’s naked breasts and others wore outfits of anatomically correct female genitalia. Street marchers were most often vulgar when engaging someone with a camera or who might oppose them. The refrains “F-Trump” or “F-you” were frequent occurrences as marchers paraded past video equipment. The “F-word” was all over signage and on the lips of two of the speakers. Supposedly they’re all upset about something Donald Trump said eleven years ago in a private conversation. Yet they use language equally bad or even worse in public discourse! On the other hand, Trump’s public statements since running for office have been almost entirely free of obscenities. I think he uttered two regarding defeating ISIS early on and he learned his lesson. He’s gotten better, more controlled and scripted as he’s gone along while his opponents have become publicly out of control and vulgar.  The irony seems completely lost on these people. The level of incivility that was demonstrated is simply not good, healthy, or persuasive public discourse. Middle-America was watching and it simply reinforced the reasons that they voted for Donald Trump.

Crowd Size

According to the mainstream media, we are supposed to infer from the size of the crowds that there is some kind of movement brewing. This movement is supposed to be uniting America’s women against a Trump presidency and derailing his agenda. Nothing could be further from the truth. The truth is that the people who marched were basically the same people who opposed Donald Trump during the campaign. We are told there were 2.9 million people who marched in various cities nationwide. Although they want to emphasize the “women’s” angle on this march, these crowds were not limited to women only. Men also participated as did some underage children. The actual number of women who participated will never be known. For simplicity’s sake, we’ll treat the 2.9 million as if it were all women just to see what we can learn from it. There are approximately 125.9 million adult women in the country. This number would represent only 2.3% of the female adult population. Furthermore it would represent only 4.4% of the total number of voters who cast their vote for Hillary Clinton and roughly 8% of the women who voted for her. So it is not difficult to imagine that a bunch of like-minded men and women who lost a bitter and contentious election could muster a fraction of that number for a rally on a Saturday in January. So the size of the march is ultimately meaningless. No policies were changed. No dialogue was entered into. No new political leaders were elected. For all of the time, effort, and publicity, the net effect was zero. It was simply a “feel good” moment for the political losers to get together and have a pep rally with a group hug of solidarity. And just for the record, somewhere in the neighborhood of 30 million women voted for Trump.

 Women’s Concerns

I’m told by some that this march was about “women’s concerns”. The two major points seem to be maintaining a federal pro-abortion law and opposing the repeal of the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare). Last I looked both men and women had the ACA and basic biology teaches that both a man and woman are necessary components for conception, so these are hardly exclusively women’s concerns. A third thing that was frequently mentioned was standing up to what Fonda called, the “Predator-in-Chief”. It would be much easier to take the issue seriously had there been a feminist outcry against Bill Clinton when he was the actual Predator-in-Chief or if they took seriously Islamic oppression of women both here and abroad. Where were the protests at the Saudi Arabian embassy? There were none. Instead, they embrace Islam as if it is a long lost brother – completely oblivious to the facts that it detests LGBTs to the point of execution, subjugates women, and abuses them. Real misogyny gets a pass while they focus on killing babies in the womb and other liberal political fixations. It would also be easier to consider this as being about “women’s concerns” if women with politically divergent ideas were invited to participate. Instead, Pro-Life women were excluded as were those who supported Donald Trump or held conservative positions. No one representing the traditional Roman Catholic teachings on birth control, marriage, family, or abortion spoke. This was a march solely for anti-Trump, left-wing liberals.

Role Models

Somehow we’re supposed to look at this march and find strong, independent role-models for our daughters. Yet none of the public faces of the march would I want to see my daughters emulate. The costumes. The language. The vitriol. The abortions. The number of failed marriages represented on the stage. None of these are things I would wish for my daughters to wear, say, act, have, or do.  There was no exaltation of classic femininity. The refined woman of dress and demeanor was not featured. The charm and iron of motherhood didn’t make the cut. The restraint and poise of being a “lady” was not on display. Grace and elegance were in absentia. The verbal craft of the feminine intellectual deftly forming persuasive argumentation failed to appear. There was no equivalent to Phyllis Schlafly, Margaret Thatcher, Christina Hoff Sommers, Laura Ingraham, or Ann Coulter present. Kellyanne Conway was not an invited speaker even though she is a woman, wife, mother, and brilliant political strategist who just broke a glass ceiling that rocked the political world. Incidentally, none of the aforementioned women had to take their clothes off, sing raunchy lyrics, or otherwise demean themselves in order to get noticed and become powerful, rich, or famous. There are your examples of true female empowerment.

Same Old, Same Old

The times, they are a-changin’. The old ways of effecting your political will no longer work. Marches are a thing of a by-gone era. Everybody does them. They’ve lost their sensationalism. Slandering your opponent as being Hitler, racist, sexist, xenophobic, or homophobic have become so trite that no one believes them anymore. These are pages from a past playbook that has lost its effect with the education of the American population, the experiences of Obamacare, lack of immigration control, foreign policy failures, and a debt that has run wild. The Internet, with its growing network of social media, news sources, podcasts, YouTube channels, and radio has made the sharing of information and ideas a much easier and more broad thing than at any time before. Outright liberal media has failed to garner much audience in these mediums. It has completely failed in radio where drawing and holding an audience is essential to success. It will be up to those on the left to see if they can find new and effective ways to connect with the American people. Wearing vagina costumes, saying “F-Trump”, and talking about menstrual blood won’t do it. It is just another day at the circus freak show to the average American.