Democratic strategists and told Politico Magazine their concerns about their party’s difficulty in connecting with men in order to find a solution to the left’s "masculinity problem."
"It’s hard to deny that Democrats have a masculinity problem," Politico Magazine wrote in a story published Sunday and headlined, "Democrats Have a Man Problem. These Experts Have Ideas for Fixing It."
"What Republicans have done is taken this threatened masculinity, and taken masculine anxieties, and forged them into a weapon for the far right. And what Democrats have done in response is pretty much nothing, mostly," University of California Hastings School of Law professor Joan Williams told Politico Magazine.
The figures assembled for a round-table-style Zoom call included several party insiders, and they discussed how they hoped to counter the GOP’s seeming success in messaging on masculinity.
"There are really two abiding themes in masculinity," Williams said. "The macho man — Trump’s got that covered — and the good man."
"The only people I see articulating that are other Republicans, which makes me a little sad as a Democrat," Williams said.
Author and filmmaker Jackson Katz told Democrats they need to court the "White male vote" if they want to dominate on a national level. He also praised former President Trump for how he, in "speech after speech," takes care to name-check professions dominated by working-class males, like firefighters, truckers and police.
"It’s brilliant because what they feel is a sense of cultural recognition," he said.
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"If you can peel back a small percentage of White men from voting Republican by talking to them in a language that they can understand, by assertively saying that their economic interests are better served by what we’re trying to do here, then you’re going to have supermajorities to pass progressive legislation."
Political strategist Joshua Ulibarri termed the conservative understanding of masculinity as "White male aggression."
"If we think that the way to react to this White male aggression and politics is to have Democrats turn that aggression back on Republicans, that is not going to happen," Ulibarri said. "That’s not the kind of masculinity, or male leadership, that our candidates and our party and our voters are going to respond to."
Politico argued that views on "masculinity have been an important predictor of votes for Donald Trump. And while Black and Latino voters still overwhelmingly lean Democratic, men in those communities are turning to Republicans at higher rates than women," Politico continued.
Politico contributing writer Joanna Weiss noted there were some Democratic candidates "right now who are trying to present a traditional masculine image."
"In Josh Hawley’s upcoming Senate race, one of his Democratic challengers is a guy named Lucas Kunce. He’s got a very deep voice and a very square jaw. And he’s got these ads that are basically accusing Hawley of being a weenie. He’s leaning into that almost performative, caricature version of a manly man," he said.
