On the long road to Election Day, no group of voters has been more loyal to Donald Trump than young white men. One early theory was that its success with this demographic was a result of male isolation and loneliness. But it demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of Mr. Trump’s appeal. He has done so well with male voters because he is a walking avatar of a kind of masculinity that Democrats could never embrace, and his appeal transcends this election cycle.

Mr. Trump has proposed a regressive idea of ​​masculinity in which power over women is a birthright. That this particularly appealed to white men is no coincidence: it intersects with other types of rights, including the idea that white people are superior to other races and more qualified to hold positions of power, and that all The success achieved by women and minorities has been unfairly bestowed upon them by DEI programs, affirmative action, and government subsidies. For men unhappy with their status, this view blames a group of people, which seems more tangible than blaming systemic problems such as rising economic inequality and the difficulty of adapting to technological and cultural changes.

The Trump campaign was channeling what psychologists call “hegemonic masculinity” the belief that “good” men dominate hierarchies of power and status, that they are mentally and physically strong, that they must embody the opposite of all that is feminine – and that this domination not only over women but on all less powerful groups is the natural consequence order and what is best for everyone.

A 2021 study by psychologists Theresa Vescio and Nathaniel Schermerhorn found that hegemonic masculinity was a better predictor of whether people perceive Mr. Trump as a good leader in 2016 and 2020 than sexism or racism alone. This was a better indicator than trust in government or even party affiliation.

Mr. Trump’s rally speeches were disjointed, but they expressed this worldview coherently and consistently. I don’t think it’s strategic; Mr. Trump himself has always revered power and status for its own sake, domination over women and hostility toward minorities. He always considered himself the toughest, the best, the strongest, the winningest. He was just being himself.

When he wanted to insult his enemies, he identified them by qualities that the rules of hegemonic masculinity code as feminine: less intelligent (“low-IQ” Robert DeNiro), feminized (“Tampon Tim” Walz), weak (“sleepy Joe”). . If the enemy was a woman, he described her from the angle of sexuality or motherhood, because for him, this is the primary value of a woman for men. So it’s no surprise that he described Ms. Harris as “low IQ” and “lazy” and gleefully suggested she slept her way to the top.

You could hear it all when Tucker Carlson invited a crowd to imagine how absurd it would be for Ms. Harris to claim victory. “She got 85 million votes,” he said sarcastically, “because she is just so impressive as the first low-IQ, former Samoan-Malaysian prosecutor from California to be elected president.” Mr. Trump has made this kind of open bigotry acceptable to Republicans, and it’s not going away until the next election cycle.

Professionally successful women who do not have children can appear as a threat, both to the men who adhere to these ideals and to the hierarchy that allows men to justify their status and power. For men who feel displaced, accusing women and minorities of having an unfair advantage, demanding that their supposedly ill-gotten gains be reversed and their subordinate position restored, could be an attractive option. This is a situation that the Trump campaign has encouraged at every turn.

There is an irony in this, in that the systems of real advantage—inherited wealth, admissions to elite colleges, nepotistic career advancement—were all designed to benefit white men. Maybe no one embodies this unearned privilege better than Mr. Trumpbut the ideological framework in which it evolves does not allow it to be recognized. Instead, its beneficiaries insist that the rest of the world transform itself into a reactionary power structure.

Connect the dots – the sarcastic insults, the brotastic podcasts, the attacks on reproductive rights and the emphasis on pronatalism – and you get a world in which women are told to abandon the workforce and get busy domestic matters, by making themselves sexually available. (but only to their husbands), have children, and support their husband’s career, without regard to the effects on their work, time, and happiness.

Some observers have criticized Ms Harris for not doing enough to accommodate a regressive view of masculinity, suggesting she could have picked up some votes, for example, by proposing military service as a remedy for male alienation , or avoiding reasonable criticism of sexism because it can make some men feel attacked. But such prescriptions only reinforce hegemonic masculinity, which is inconsistent with a vision of America where the needs and interests of women and minorities are valued no less than those of white men.

It is not up to women to convince men of our humanity, our abilities and our potential. But the conception of masculinity that Mr. Trump appeals to also harms men, by offering easy, attractive answers that ultimately leave his supporters even more isolated.

This article was originally published in The New York Times.