To anyone with even an iota of decency, Donald Trump’s online slagging of Mika Brzezinski was a new low, even for him. Regardless of political shade, Trump’s claim that he refused to let the “Morning Joe” co-host spend the weekend at Mar-a-Lago because of botched plastic surgery was denounced as the sexist and misogynistic bilge that it was.
But according to one of Trump’s staunchest fundie supporters, those who are attacking Trump are the ones with a problem. While the near-universal outraged over Trump’s ugly tweets was in full boil, black conservative pastor Jesse Lee Peterson let it be known that he was outraged by the outrage.
If you're mad @POTUS fighting back & spanking classless liberals like @morningmika, you might be a girly man ????#Justsayin
— Jesse Lee Peterson (@JLPtalk) June 30, 2017
Okay, Jesse Lee. I’ll play. Even if you accept Trump’s argument that Brzezinski was bullying him on Thursday morning, there was no defensible reason whatsoever for him to attack her in such an outrageously degrading manner. Not now, not ever. It’s one thing for the White House to effectively say that Trump has the right to use any means, no matter how degrading, to defend himself. But a pastor–even someone as rabidly pro-Trump as you are?
Your suggestion that any man who was outraged by Trump’s words is a “girly man” is almost as degrading as Trump’s original attack. Are you saying, sir, that basic decency is a sign that you’re “girly”? Are you willing to tell people like Lindsey Graham and Ben Sasse, among others, that they aren’t real men for condemning this bilge? And are you willing to do so to their faces, sir, rather than from the comfort of your studio in Los Angeles?
Unless I’m very wrong here, Peterson is essentially saying that a man every right to use degrading language against a woman who supposedly wrongs him. So we have a pastor who may be saying that two wrongs make a right.
At first glance, we shouldn’t be all that surprised that Peterson is standing by Trump. After all, he considers Trump to be an example of how a real man should behave. As proof, he thought Trump’s shoving of the Montenegrin prime minister at the NATO summit was something to be applauded. But this is something else altogether. Peterson is effectively telling men that they have no right to stand up for women. That would be an outrageous sentiment in any case, but especially so from a pastor.
But it turns out that Peterson has been caught on tape degrading women himself. You may recall that a West Virginia mayor came under fire in November for calling Michelle Obama an “ape in heels.” In the midst of that controversy, Peterson saw fit to join in on the sliming. Watch a clip here.
Peterson didn’t see what the fuss was about. After all, he didn’t think Michelle was truly “dignified.” Instead, he thought she was a “hoochie mama” whose ways were rubbing off on Malia. So it really does come as no shock that he has no problem with the way Trump attacked Brzezinski. After all, he’s as small a man as Trump is.
Peterson’s stock in trade is “rebuilding the man” through his nonprofit, the Brotherhood Organization for a New Destiny. If a “rebuilt man” is supposed to act in the manner that Trump did, it’s time to take a wrecking ball to BOND. And if “rebuilt men” have no business defending women from being degraded, it’s time to take a wrecking ball to BOND.
Both together? Peterson is a depraved and debauched disgrace to the race, just like Bill Cosby. That’s the only way you can describe someone who thinks a man who defends women isn’t a real man. After all, there is no difference between saying that and finding it acceptable to “joke” about spiking a woman’s drink.
(featured image courtesy BOND’s Facebook)
