Tom Nichols of The Atlantic has a simple question:
…I have been baffled by one mystery in particular: Why do working-class white men—the most reliable component of Donald Trump’s base—support someone who is, by their own standards, the least masculine man ever to hold the modern presidency? The question is not whether Trump fails to meet some archaic or idealized version of masculinity. The president’s inability to measure up to Marcus Aurelius or Omar Bradley is not the issue. Rather, the question is why so many of Trump’s working-class white male voters refuse to hold Trump to their own standards of masculinity—why they support a man who behaves more like a little boy.
I believe there actually is a simple answer.
For Nichols, he’s perplexed because the working class men he grew up around would generally look down on a person like Trump. They don’t easily show their emotions and they don’t brag about their sexual exploits. Their word is their bond, and a handshake means something. Working hard without a lot of complaint is considered virtuous even if individually there’s always some griping.
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