As I watch Rachel Maddow read excerpts from Mary Trump's book, I am reminded that if we valued women, at all, Donald Trump would not be president at the exact moment we most need competence.

If men were sanctioned for preying on women - Trump wouldn't have become prominent.

If Americans cared when women report that a powerful man has attacked them - Trump would have been hounded from the field.

If the words "grab them by the pussy" mattered - Trump would have lost.

Imagine if Trump had come up in a world in which abusing/harassing/assaulting women was not seen as scoring. Imagine if, as a businessman, he moved in a world in which these things were deal-breakers. Imagine if, when the Access Hollywood tapes came out, he'd been shunned.

There were many points in Donald Trump's life, a life marked, at ALL points, by the serial, predatory abuse of girls & women, at which a society that valued women could have prevented him failing up & into the Oval Office.

And now toxic masculinity is very literally killing us.

That we are dying in our tens of thousands, are fighting tooth & nail to salvage the Republic, & now face decades w a SCOTUS & judicial system that systematically devalues the lives of women - that's the patriarchy at work. That's what not valuing women in the first place got you

All we had to do - ALL WE HAD TO DO - to avoid this horror show was not give men a pass when they assault women. That was it.

We didn't have to give women equal pay. We didn't have to grant women abortion rights. We didn't have to put more women on editorial boards or corporate boards or give more women tenure or put more women in the Senate.

We just had to not give men a pass when they assault us.

Are you hearing how low the bar is? How little we needed to be able to summon from ourselves in order to prevent this craven incompetent from shredding the Republic & killing tens of thousands of us on the way?

We just had to not give men a pass when they assault women.

Of course if we chose to, we could look at every aspect of American life - or indeed, human society - and consider what we might gain &/or prevent if we JUST stopped giving men a pass when they assault women.

But just consider this White House. What if we'd valued women instead.

Well this has blown up! I guess this is my soundcloud:

*end qualified immunity now

*arrest the cops who murdered #BreonnaTaylor

*support women fighting for women: https://timesupnow.org/ 

Adding this here, because it's part of the story: https://twitter.com/emilylhauser/status/1280862639023939584

PS The fact that we give men a pass when they assault women is so central to human culture that if we tell women to stop voting for any man who has ever hurt any woman - WOMEN WILL EFFECTIVELY LOSE THE VOTE

Pls acknowledge that women must do this calculus every day of our lives.