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To say that Republican presidential nominee Donald J. Trump has lowered the bar is to engage with the obvious. Since his first words on Mexican immigration, a speech that would have sent any other politician into self-imposed exile, the New York real estate baron has sunk lower and lower in his quest to subvert decency and democracy. In his recent conflation of sexual abuse with the braggadocio of sexual achievement, Mr. Trump has once again dragged down the measure of central tendency for all men. Many of us can now rest on a throne of our own mediocre laurels, knowing that we are three standard deviations removed from the likes of Donald J. Trump.
I took to Twitter to set the record straight on my experiences with locker room talk. This led to a series of memories on pop culture debates and my ongoing efforts to pass as someone who cares about sports. As the likes and retweets rolled in, I sat secure in the knowledge that I was righteous. Are you not entertained? Also, am I not a good person?
There’s no answering the latter without talking about a time when locker room talk wasn’t banal and safe.
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There’s no answering the latter without talking about a time when locker room talk wasn’t banal and safe. I’m hard pressed to excessively excoriate the short and portly 13 year-old version of myself who witnessed these events in silence. Yet as a man a few days past his 35th birthday, I think the time has come to honestly reflect on this particular history lesson.
In the fall of 1995 I was in the ninth grade, and the seventh period of every day, for the entire school year, was the bane of my freshman life: gym class. The mandatory nature of ninth grade physical education produced a cross section of social cliques and identities in matching shorts and school t-shirts. Would-be athletes formed an entente cordiale with the bookish as both were surrounded by stoners, semi-literates, the willfully ignorant, and the odd sociopath.
One such union of ignorance and monstrousness came in the form of a boy called Kenny. Kenny revelled in puffing out his chest at the expense of others. He would act as the “as seen on TV” upperclassman, doling out ritual hazing and emotional torments as an arbiter of broader social inclusion. It should also surprise no one at all to learn that Kenny was a loud mouth about his particular brand of Christianity. “Judge not lest ye be judged,” did not apply to the gospel according to Kenny. In sum, he was the kind of kid who you hoped would never find more authority in his adult life than that which is conferred upon a used car salesman.
Kenny’s victim of choice was a boy called Farrokh. Farrokh was of Iranian background, rail-thin, terrible at sports, spoke with a lisp, and was neither bookish nor in possession of a razor-sharp wit. Any one of those things might have offered him a shield against Kenny. Farrokh sealed his fate on the day he announced, before the entire locker room, that he adored Michael Jackson. This was 1995; Jackson’s then place in the public eye had more to do with child sex abuse scandals than music. One can imagine the ammunition Farrokh’s statement offered a low-life like Kenny.
Since our phys-ed teacher demanded a culture of mutual respect in his class, Kenny was limited to hit-and-run tactics. The only time he could deliver a consistent assault against Farrokh was if they both happened to be on the far side of the track we ran on a daily basis. From inside his office, adjacent to the locker room, our teacher heard all that happened after class. Like a UN Peacekeeper, his very presence dissuaded bad behavior. Then came the week he was sick, and my school’s other gym teacher took over the class.
This was a man of the old guard: Theodore Roosevelt to our usual Jimmy Carter. Feelings were for girls. Empathy was for the weak. Life was football, and if we had a problem with that, we were loudly and publically invited to unbind our panties from around our balls and act like men. This was Monday.
On Tuesday, in the unsupervised locker room, Kenny attacked. His opening salvo rings as clear today as it did then.
“Farookh, you’re a real f****t, aren’t you? You know what they did to f****ts in the bible? They stoned them.”
The more Farookh demanded Kenny leave him alone, the more Kenny pressed. Kenny was smart enough to know not to hit Farookh, but that didn’t stop him from spewing the kind of hateful venom that would make the average social media troll blush.
Under his banner of making America great, Trump invites regular folk to share in his misogyny, racism, transphobia, and other assorted vices promoted as virtues.
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Everyone in the locker room, even Kenny’s bullying entourage, stood silent on this day. I remember hating what I was seeing. I also knew that if I spoke up, I’d be making a target of myself. There was no culture of tolerance, no sympathy for difference, no notion of compassion, in my very white, very suburban, high school.
Twenty years later, in a world that is supposed to be better than the one I grew up in, and people are still waving away “locker room talk” or rationalizing it with a writ of “boys being boys.” I’ve always believed that as a civilization we were moving in the right direction, recognizing there was still much to be done. Now I ponder how many Kennys in the English speaking world look at Trump and see the avatar for their prejudices? A man who brushes away shared morality and social obligation under the auspices of aristocratic indifference. How many more people look at his fanatic legions, wondering if this is the way the world ends? Silence and inaction once led me to carry two decades of guilt and shame. I do not make such mistakes twice.
To that end, I’ll say it is too tempting and too easy to claim a moral high ground because one isn’t the shambling monument to moral relativism that is Donald J. Trump. Donald Trump makes many a sub-par person seem good by contrast. Under his banner of making America great, Trump invites regular folk to share in his misogyny, racism, transphobia, and other assorted vices promoted as virtues. There is no nobility in refusing to jump on his bandwagon. There’s no praise to be found in declining an invitation to being a monster. To paraphrase Chris Rock, you’re not supposed to do that, dummy.
So long as Trump can effortlessly lead his followers down a path of turning people into “Others,” the rest of us have a moral obligation to speak up, not simply to snark. The gesture is small. Indeed, an individual voice of condemnation might feel impotent against the frothing anger of millions, but silence, or worse, smugness, risks eroding our collective moral compass.
We are capable of so much better than the likes of Donald J. Trump. And to that end, we must do more to engage the better angels of our humanity at a time when one man would have us forget they exist. Because it is never just locker room talk. Locker room talk is the first few degrees on the long arc back to a time when laissez-faire cruelty, victim blaming, and profiting from injustice were the highest of male virtues. We must be better than that.
Photo: Getty Images
Not at all surprised my response didn’t get through. But I’ll try it again. We hear so much about what Trump locker room talk was but we ignore who Hillary has headline one of her events? Jay Z!!!! …. here some lyrics from a couple of his songs One is titled “P****.” The power of the P****, Thatz why every mutherf**** in the world dress fly. Every baller that can afford it they cop the best ride, for the power of the P****. (Let’s have some fun)The power of the P****, thatz why n***** get they Another is titled “B******… Read more »
Tom, you’re right. This sort of so-called “music” does have a corrosive effect on society. I’ve heard a few of these “songs” at my health club. As the father of two wonderful daughters, I find them to be quite offensive.
There is a special form of hypocrisy that is called politics, and it’s found on both sides of the political spectrum. I appreciate your comments regarding this particular issue.
Locker room talk … Let’s take a look at who Hillary had as a headliner at her recent campaign event? Jay Z’s song lyrics … The power of the P****, Thatz why every mutherf**** in the world dress fly.Every baller that can afford it they cop the best ride, for the power of the P****. (Let’s have some fun)The power of the P****, thatz why n***** get they hair cut, try to dress fly. Here is another … Another is titled “B****** and Sisters.” Sisters get respect, b****** get what they deserve Other tunes … http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/jayz/ignorantshit.html http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/jayz/holahovito.html Yup, that’s who… Read more »
When I was in grade school and much of high school I was terrible at PE. It was a horrible class for me too. For a while I thought I was just nonathletic but then took up weight lifting and kick boxing and come to realize it was team sports I wasn’t good at. That brings me to an observation and a question. There are other classes that people aren’t good at, but they don’t seem to generate the same angst. I wonder of it’s because thongs are more private. When people take tests, their scores aren’t read out in… Read more »
You’re musing while I’m getting angry. Not at you personally, John. I’m getting mad at the deliberate ignorance and stupidity that is associated with this issue. There are a number of reasons why mandatory P.E. causes such “angst,” as you put it, especially among nonathletic boys; but most people really don’t seem to care. When masculinity is defined in terms of athletic prowess, nonathletic boys are going to be denigrated as wimps, “sissies,” etc. Don’t you think such boys might get tired of being put down all the time? Some boys are bullied simply for not having an interest in… Read more »
Bill, I understand your frustration. I was a nonathletic guy myself, always picked last. I’m just trying to balance it with the benefits of exercise and team sports or at least what people tell me are the benefits of team sports. Maybe the bad things can be fixed and we could keep the good things. I found great benefit to martial arts and weight lifting, but I started out lifting at home and I think that helped. I was also taught basic martial arts by friends and family before I entered the dojang. There was a brown belt who liked… Read more »
John, I don’t think you understand fully. But I give you credit for not coming back with a snarky response, which is exactly what I’d expect from most sports fans. I commend you for being civil, but I don’t think you really understand. As far as entertainment preferences are concerned, I don’t believe anyone should ridicule someone else’s interests or his choice of recreation. I have never looked down on any guy for participating in a sport. But I’m convinced that many athletic guys do look down on nonathletic guys. Not all, but many. And for no good reason. For… Read more »
P.S. There is a typo in about the eleventh paragraph. “sing” should be “stating.”
I said I wouldn’t post again, but I’ve changed my mind. This post will be my final one. After this one, no more. I definitely will not post again in this topic or in any forum of a controversial nature. I have asked you a number of questions, but you need not answer them for me because I won’t be coming back to read your responses. You can say what you like in my absence – which, if my good sense prevails, will be permanent. I changed my mind because I kept thinking about the brown belt whom you said… Read more »
@ Bill The rumors surfaced about the same time he had left the dojang. One day he just didn’t show up anymore. 30 years ago I thought the same way as you. He bastardize my art and if we ever meet there’s going to be h*ll to pay, but then I got older. You’re taught to walk away from fights. Why would I seek a fight over a rumor regardless of how bad it was? For all I know, he stopped going to the dojang because he was in jail. My brother and friends had looked into different martial arts… Read more »
Fair response. Touche! You should have seen the long post I was going to submit. I spent more than just a few minutes writing it! lol I’m glad I read your reply above. If I hadn’t read it and I had posted my newly written long post, I would have made myself look like a raging idiot! lol As you may have noticed, I have two “hot button” issues: bullying and rape – both of which are defended by many people. For example, watching a few You Tube videos about the high rape rates in Norway and Sweden caused by… Read more »
Martial artists can be jocks too, but as a general rule they only talk smack to guys better than they are or at the same level. A Hispanic friend of mine became friends with a Filipino guy from another town. He was a second degree black belt and heard that a friend of mine also named John was very, very, good. He could have been world class. He was such a natural talent that when he was a blue belt Sa Bum Nim gave him a temporary black belt to fight in competition and he still won more trophies than… Read more »
I wasn’t athletic either.
That said I can’t get behind this idea that PE should be an elective, just because there are people who aren’t interested. That’s true for every subject. If a boy was teased in English because he couldn’t read well, should he then be allowed to opt out?
No the solution is to fix PE, not tell students “you don’t have to if it’s too hard”
I’m not sure you read my post carefully. In fact, you ignored most of what I had to say. Perhaps you should read my post again. I was saying that traditional PE should be offered as an elective for athletically inclined boys and those who simply want to play sports. The point I was trying to make (which you have completely ignored) is that the traditional “sports only” approach does NOT promote physical fitness for non-athletes. I would require that all students, including non-athletes, take a class that follows the PE4Life program. This program was designed for the purpose of… Read more »
Thanks for the excellent article, Adam! I have so much to say in reply to it that I will have to post more than once. (Please excuse my dumb avatar.) You deal with an issue that has been ignored by the media, especially the sports media – namely, the bullying of nonathletic boys in schools by athletes and coaches. More about that later. One issue at a time. . . . Concerning your former “Christian” classmate Kenny, I have this to say: I speak as a guy who became a Christian at the age of 26. I strongly believe in… Read more »
I think people are over reacting to this locker room talk stuff. Certainly there are cases like you mentioned and Trump which are beyond the pale, but I suspect that if I wanted to, I could find numerous web pages along the lines of the hottest sports announcers or UFC ring girls. I could probably even find an article about Olympic athletes and their “packages”. I think people have taken examples of 10s on the objectionable meter and are trying to use that to invalidate anything over a 1 and even then it’s only anything over a 1 that they… Read more »