Daughters

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has responded to Yoho’s “I won’t apologize” yesterday.

“And I want to be clear that representative Yoho’s comments were not deeply hurtful or piercing to me,” she added. “Because I have worked a working-class job. I have waited tables and I have ridden the subway. I have walked the streets in New York City. And this kind of language is not new. I have encountered words uttered by Mr. Yoho and men uttering the same words as Mr. Yoho while I was being harassed in restaurants. I have tossed men out of bars that have used language like Mr. Yoho’s.”

In other words he talked to her the way drunk assholes in bars have talked to her. Not what women should have to expect from colleagues (or anyone else, including drunks in bars).

Ocasio-Cortez, who said Wednesday that Yoho’s remarks did not amount to an apology, said Thursday he went to the House floor to “make excuses for his behavior.”

“And that I could not let go. I could not allow my nieces, I could not allow the little girls I go home to, I could not allow victims of verbal abuse and worse to see that, to see that excuse and to see our Congress accept it as legitimate,” she said. “And to accept it as an apology. And to accept silence as a form of acceptance, I could not allow that to stand.”

“Mr. Yoho mentioned that he has a wife and two daughters,” she said. “I am two years younger than Mr. Yoho’s youngest daughter. I am someone’s daughter, too. My father, thankfully, is not alive to see how Mr. Yoho treated his daughter. My mother got to see Mr. Yoho’s disrespect on the floor of this House towards me on television, and I am here because I have to show my parents that I am their daughter and that they did not raise me to accept abuse from men.”

The exchange between Yoho and Ocasio-Cortez was first reported by The Hill, which said Yoho called Ocasio-Cortez “disgusting” for suggesting unemployment and poverty were leading to a rise in crime in New York City.

“You are out of your freaking mind,” Yoho told Ocasio-Cortez, who then told him that he was “rude,” The Hill wrote, adding that the conversation was overheard by a reporter and that Yoho said “f—ing bitch” as he walked away. In a statement to NBC News, a Yoho spokesman denied that he used the slur.

The spokesman wasn’t there; why should we believe the spokesman?

Pelosi pointed out that it’s what women face, and it shouldn’t be.

“It’s a manifestation of attitudes in our society really, I can tell you that firsthand, they’ve called me names for at least at least 20 years of leadership, 18 years of leadership,” she said. “There’s no limit to the disrespect or the lack of acknowledgement of the strength of women and nothing brings more, nothing is more wholesome for our government for our politics for our country than the increased participation of women and women will be treated with respect.”

Step one: don’t call us fucking bitches.

Comments are closed.