To the Editor:

For once and for all, president-elect Donald Trump did not "brag about committing sexual assault," as stated in your Jan. 18 NorthCountryNow.com article "More Than 150 North Country Residents to Travel to Washington D.C. for Women’s March on Washington."

When he remarked that, "When you're a star, they let you do it. They let you do anything," he was referring to the fact that many women, if they get the opportunity, make themselves sexually available to high-status men, or stars, as Trump terms them. This phenomenon is present in human as well as in animal society, as documented by Franz de Waal in his classic study Chimpanzee Politics.

Not all women can gain access to high-status males. But in any case, many women try to "marry up"; that is, they try to marry a man who is from a higher economic and social background than the woman's own.

Throughout history, women have made themselves sexually available to emperors, kings, presidents, tycoons, artists, and real estate magnates in an attempt to barter their favors for security and advantage for themselves and any eventual offspring.

It's the way of the world.

Kevin Beary

Colton