People often toss the word “irony” around when they only mean that something is sad or funny or unpleasant. But a truly ironic situation popped up in politics last week. It is perfect irony that Donald Trump has become a poster boy for the women’s rights movement. If not for him, an important conversation would not be taking place across the media.
Until now, and I don’t know why, “locker room talk” has always been sacrosanct. It’s sort of a general agreement that what happens in Vegas stay in Vegas, and whatever you say on the internet can be kept private. Which, as people are finally figuring out, is wishful thinking at best. For the most part it’s complete stupidity. And now, because of Trump’s huge “slip,” everybody is talking about it.
I have always been aghast at locker room talk. I can’t figure out what these people think they’re doing. Because people who are talking like that sound like a**holes. They are making derogatory comments about their wives, their girlfriends, their workmates. They are demonstrating that they are two-faced bigots who would stab you in the back the moment you walked out of the room.
And ladies, don’t get holier-than-thou about this, because you have your own version. But what small amount of “girl talk” I have been let in on leads me to believe that it isn’t quite so blatantly sexist as locker room talk. In fact, it seems that the nicer sex don’t actually find men that interesting to talk about, and reserve a large chunk of their venom for each other. But the effect is the same. By indulging in locker room talk, you are demonstrating what kind of a person you are when you are not being constrained by society’s rules.
Trevor Noah makes the point that sure, maybe Trump’s comments were locker room talk. But it wasn’t in a locker room. It was in a TV studio. If you talk like that everywhere, it’s not locker room talk. It’s your personality. You don’t just sound like an a**hole in private. You are one.
What happens in Vegas will eventually come around and bite you. Whatever you say on the Internet will be broadcast to the world. And what you say in the locker when you are relaxed and under no social pressure to conform is an honest demonstration of what kind of a person you really are.
I have always thought it a good idea to speak about others as if they are standing at your shoulder, listening to what you say. Because one day, believe me, they will be.
Let’s hope, for the sake of the American people, that the voters are listening
Irony #2
According to CBC commentators after tonight’s debate, formerly hot topics with conservatives, immigration, for example, have now become so associated with Donald Trump that they have completely lost traction in the media. Heard from one pro-Republican commentator: “The Republicans lost the election the moment they signed Trump on. They’re just beginning to find out by how much.”