Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz is a man of many identities. He’s a rich twerp who grew up knowing he was a rich twerp; he’s a seditious creep whose personal politics seem to start and end at the question “How can this be good for me, Matt Gaetz?”; he’s a credibly accused sex pest. Yet above all else — or, perhaps more accurately, underlying it all — is the fundamental, no frills, naked truth that Matt Gaetz is an asshole.
I don’t say this lightly. There are a lot of people in the world today, and especially in the world of politics, who are “assholes” in the “they do and say things that I don’t particularly like or agree with” sense. But Gaetz isn’t that. His assholedom isn’t contingent upon your personal beliefs or political inclinations. His is a pure, unadulterated, wholly objective asshole-ness. It exists entirely independent of the zeitgeist — a platonic ideal of being an absolute, irredeemable schmuck.
Here’s Gaetz at the Nazi-endorsed Turning Points USA conference this weekend, where he stood before the next generation of conservo-fascists and declared that no one wants to have sex with reproductive rights advocates because “nobody wants to impregnate you if you look like a thumb.”
Coming from a man who looks like a large toe with hair, Gaetz’s jibe is the sort of classic junior-high assholedom you’d expect from someone who laughs while his bigger, stronger goonsquad gives the valedictorian a swirlie. There’s no larger point or objective here. It’s just being a dick for the sake of being a dick — which is pretty much Gaetz’s whole thing. He’s not sorry, or even all that bothered by the potential blowback of his unrepentant assholeishness.
Look at him! He loves this! Insulting people for no reason, entirely out of the blue? He’s all for it! I wish there were some sort of lesson here, but there really isn’t. No moral, no takeaway, no silver lining. The man is just an asshole. Feh.
