They Do Respect Her, But . . .

U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand caused a stir when she revealed that many of her fellow male lawmakers in Washington are sexist pigs who have no shame even when dealing with the women in their ranks.  She just won't say whom.

In Senator Gillibrand's new book, "Off the Sidelines," the New York Democrat talks about how her male colleagues in both the Senate and the House of Representatives made sexist comments to her about her appearance, especially with regards to her weight.  Once, a senator confronted her after she'd lost fifty pounds, grabbed her by the stomach, and said to her, "Don’t lose too much weight now. I like my girls chubby!"Another time, a where a male colleague saw her in the gym said, "Good thing you’re working out, because you wouldn't want to get porky!"  She reportedly responded, "Thanks, a–hole." 

We all knew that members of the United States Congress are neither distinguished nor gentlemen, but we probably weren't aware of how vulgar and misogynistic some of - some of - the men on Capitol Hill can be to the women.  And these are the fellows who set the agenda for legislation, including bills dealing with women's issues.  The consensus is that the fact that most of the men Gillibrand refers to but doesn't name are mainly older senators in their sixties, seventies, or eighties suggests that it's a generational thing.  Just remember, though; some of those members of Congress in their fifties were teenagers in the 1970s and probably were into Kiss, who famously began their debut album with a sexist song.  ("Everybody knows she's looking good, and the lady knows it's understood - Strutter!")   And 44-year-old Paul Ryan (also a fan of heavy metal) is one of the leading generals waging the War On Women, whether he'd comment on Senator Gillibrand's weight or not.

The reason she won't identify the members of Congress who commented on her weight is because she's too decent to out them for indecency.  Also, she still has to work with some of them.  But it certainly puts them in a fix with their wives, who'll undoubtedly demand to know if they were one of the oinkers mentioned in Senator Gillibrand's book.  The ones who are innocent will have to bear the brunt of the accusations too, for even if they didn't make sexist comments toward Gillibrand, they have probably made such comments toward other female colleagues.

And wouldn't it be great if Senator Gillibrand's husband found out who the guilty parties were . . . and punched their lights out?  No, because I expect him to be as classy as his better half is.  (He should be classier than all those American lawmakers; he's British!)

Full disclosure requires me to state that I featured Kirsten Gillibrand on my beautiful women picture blog, in April 2012.  If you go to that blog entry, though, you'll notice that I list her legislative positions and her biographical data.  I don't go on about how gorgeous she is; the picture speaks for itself.  So why do I feature politicians on my beautiful women picture blog?  Not out of disrespect, rest assured; I just think my blog would be boring and obvious if I only featured entertainers, so I try to feature women of other backgrounds to make it more interesting.  But I don't say the sort of things about female public figures that the male public figures cited here have said about Mrs. Gillibrand.      

Oh yeah, Kirsten Gillibrand turns 48 this year.  That makes her young enough to be the daughter of many of the senators who made those comments about her.

I feel sick . . ..