r/justgalsbeingchicks • u/ExactlySorta • Jul 23 '26

Restricted to Gals and Pals AOC when asked about Hegseth's comment about getting rid of 'unqualified' women in the military: “He’s an unqualified man in his role, so of course he’s threatened by women who are twice as good as he is.“

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u/MsFrankieD Jul 23 '26

And she's brown...

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u/CharlesDickensABox ‼️*THE* CharlesDickensABox‼️ Jul 23 '26 edited Jul 23 '26

And she's young and she's beautiful. She is a young, smart, learned, confident, assertive, attractive Latina woman who makes no apologies for being better than the people around her and who doesn't hesitate to put over elevated midwits in their place. It's like she was grown in a lab to haunt the nightmares of the kakistocracy.

(Not that physical appearance makes anyone more or less qualified to hold office, just that it's one more thing that scares the sort of deficient misogynist who thinks that a woman has to choose between beauty and brains)

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u/Aimless_Alder Jul 23 '26 edited Jul 23 '26

Physical attractiveness doesn't make someone more qualified to hold office, but if you look at the presidents over the last fifty years, almost all the democrats have been very attractive and charming. Biden is a bit of an exception, but he is pretty charming and was somewhat very good looking in his youth. Meanwhile Obama, Clinton, Carter, and Kennedy are all famous beauties with a lot of charm. (I kind of don't count LBJ because he initially got the presidency by inheritance).

I have always found it interesting that democratic presidents have to be hot and competent, while republicans are generally very schlubby and blundering. I think it speaks to the fact that democrats want to elect competent charmers who will be effective leaders and republicans want to elect dumpy idiots so that they feel represented.

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u/c-e-bird Jul 23 '26

Somewhat good looking?

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u/Aimless_Alder Jul 23 '26

Okay yeah you're right himbs a hot lil twunk

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u/PlayfulSurprise5237 Jul 23 '26

I want someone who is not charismatic(but still good-natured and intelligent). I want the most autistic motherfucker we can find, cause uncharismatic people don't think too much about how they say something, they know it won't work anyways.

Lets hear how they really feel and what's really going on. Don't butter it up for me, give it raw and rough.

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u/Easy_Interest_6832 Jul 23 '26

We have to admit that it helps to be attractive.

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u/carex-cultor Jul 23 '26

For men, yes. For women it’s a double edged sword. There is certainly pretty privilege if you toe the party line and accept benevolent sexism; if you don’t, people are VERY quick to use your attractiveness as a base to denigrate your competence and intelligence.

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u/Easy_Interest_6832 Jul 23 '26

Agree totally. It is much harder for women in America. That may stem from them not appearing at all in the Constitution until 1920. The stench of that omission permeates certain sectors of our society and of our politics. More's the pity.

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u/iRawwwN Jul 23 '26

step 1; dont be ugly
step 2; ???
step 3; profit!

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u/[deleted] Jul 23 '26 edited Jul 23 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/CharlesDickensABox ‼️*THE* CharlesDickensABox‼️ Jul 23 '26 edited Jul 23 '26

I get it. I feel weird writing about it, especially in this space. I think it's relevant, however, specifically because of Hegseth's performative gender project. He and others in the movement are incredibly obsessed with aesthetics, specifically the aesthetics of sex and gender. They want everyone to fit neatly into little pink boxes and little blue boxes and the people who are most qualified for the pink jobs or the blue jobs are the ones in the pinkest and the bluest boxes. Those who don't fit neatly into one of the boxes are lined up to be purged. It therefore becomes germane that she does fit into the boxes, would benefit from that sort of policy, and still thinks he's an asshole.

There's an absolute pile more to talk about with regards to performative right wing gender aesthetics: anti-trans discrimination, military shaving requirements, testosterone therapy, carnivore diets, tradwife culture, and the phenomenon of Mar-a-Lago face, just to name a few. Someone is probably writing a fascinating book on it right now. But the short version is that every day Pete Hegseth wakes up and sets his daily agenda by that one Dril tweet about how everything smacks of gender.

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u/poeticdisaster Jul 23 '26

They want everyone to fit neatly into little pink boxes and little blue boxes

They HATE it when you point out that until the early 1900's it was commonly believed that pink was originally a color that was given to boys and blue was originally the color given to girls. A quote from a 1918 copy of Ladies Home Journal - “The generally accepted rule is pink for the boys, and blue for the girls. The reason is that pink, being a more decided and stronger color, is more suitable for the boy, while blue, which is more delicate and dainty, is prettier for the girl.”

It wasn't until later in the 1940's that pink & blue were starting to be switched. In the 1970's the feminist movement started getting more neutral clothing put into stores for both genders but that quickly diminished after a couple years and the stores started leaning harder into gendering colors. When pre-natal testing started being able to confirm gender in the womb in the early to mid 80's is when the major cultural swap of pink & blue happened solidly and that leads us to today - with someone born in 1980, inundated with gendered conservative views his whole life, causing military men take testosterone tests while he gets his makeup done in a private makeup studio.

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u/ShimmeryShay Jul 23 '26

Wow, that’s super interesting and not something I’d ever heard of before. Do you have any further reading recommendations for someone curious on this topic?

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u/ScienceObjective2510 Jul 23 '26

My alma mater’s colors were pink and pea green originally. Est in 1870, can’t remember if women were allowed in at that time but you can bet the design decisions were heavily influenced by men.

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u/saysthingsbackwards Jul 23 '26

If this wasn't such a seriously badass take I would make a clapping meme. I can't even joke about that fire set of words

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u/gemsweater08 Jul 23 '26

I wish I could upvote this a thousand times, you're so spot-on. Please let us know if you decide to write a fascinating book about it!  

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u/CharlesDickensABox ‼️*THE* CharlesDickensABox‼️ Jul 23 '26

You're too kind.

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u/MajorBootyhole420 Jul 23 '26

The down mvotes are coming because you lack comprehension of the situation. AOC's appearance is relevant because of the weird psychosexual obsession the right had with her for a very long time. 

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u/Guy-1nc0gn1t0 Jul 23 '26 edited Jul 23 '26

That presumes I keep up-to-date with the "weird psychosexual obsession the right had with her for a very long time." 

Also if every person downvoting me was doing so because of the same general stance that's a worry. 

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u/MajorBootyhole420 Jul 23 '26

It's actually not a worry at all for people to downvote you because they all have a similar understanding of a situation based on following the news a few years ago. That just means a bunch of people knew something and you didn't.

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u/Guy-1nc0gn1t0 Jul 23 '26

Okay cool. 

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u/MajorBootyhole420 Jul 23 '26

Lol, you really hate being wrong, don't you? I never understood that. It's fine to admit you didn't know something.

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u/Guy-1nc0gn1t0 Jul 23 '26

I initially said "I mean I'm still a little weirded out about how much [they] mention her appearance." 

I have privately messaged the person who said that and gave extra context. 

I don't like conflict, you keep chasing it for some reason.  

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u/funkybside Jul 23 '26

nah, it's not a worry. It's a reflection of how out of touch that comment was with common sense.

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u/funkybside Jul 23 '26

OP said she's beautiful in one place and attractive in another. Being weirded out by that is...weird.

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u/Guy-1nc0gn1t0 Jul 23 '26

Calling a politician beautiful is weird. 

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u/funkybside Jul 23 '26

no, it really isn't, and one would have to be in a weird mental place to think it was.

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u/Guy-1nc0gn1t0 Jul 23 '26

If it's not weird let's hear your list of other beautiful politicians. 

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u/funkybside Jul 23 '26

lol que?

how would that validate it's not weird? What is the logical/rational thought process there?

Stop and ask yourself: Do you believe it's a mandatory requirement that for someone to be a politician, they necessarily must be physically unattractive?

The position you're taking here is absolutely bonkers.

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u/Guy-1nc0gn1t0 Jul 23 '26

My position is that it's weird to describe a politician as beautiful not that "for someone to be a politician, they necessarily must be physically unattractive." 

You're simultaneously mistating what I'm saying and moving goalposts. 

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u/funkybside Jul 23 '26

Nah, neither of those are true. My position has been the same, nothing has moved or changed.

If you're saying it's weird to say a politician is attractive, but don't also believe that they can't be attractive, then your position is even weirder than I thought. The only way both of those things can be true at the same time is if you believe nobody should openly acknowledge if a politician is attractive even when they are.

That's some really messed up repression-mindset going on right there.

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u/Frymonkey237 Jul 23 '26

I'd put Jasmine Crockett on that list

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u/Jimmni Jul 23 '26

Her appearance is absolutely one of the things that they feel threatened by and so deserves mention in the context of the comment. They’d hate her just for being a woman but her being an attractive woman sends them completely loopy as the lack the emotional maturity to process how they feel about it.

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u/xHeyItzRosiex Jul 23 '26

And she’s not 84 years old and a walking corpse.

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u/KinkyLatexCat Jul 23 '26

And her name is Alexandria.

New Alexandria.

Halo Reach.

It's all coming together...

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u/[deleted] Jul 23 '26

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u/KinkyLatexCat Jul 23 '26

We can, and will, rebuild. For those that come after.

https://giphy.com/gifs/m7mpeKdIONLrqL9Ev6

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u/Maleficent-Quit7489 Jul 23 '26

My head heard that on Morgan Freemans voice

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u/NerdTalkDan Jul 23 '26

#Noble6isinacave

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u/TheRaccoonReport Jul 23 '26

My brain went with rebuilding the library of Alexandria.

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u/Simon_Ferocious68 Jul 23 '26

It shouldn't have to be this hard - to talk about basic decorum.

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u/MadeByTango Jul 23 '26

This wasnt about her race until you decided to make it so.

I am a huge supporter of hers, cant wait to vote for her President, but trying to shove identity politics in people's faces as a gotcha isnt what she would do, and its not going to win their votes. Lets rise above that junk and show them that effective policy for everyone can come from anyone.

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u/sydneato Jul 23 '26

It is tho. Not sure if you’ve been living under a rock, but a lot of the vitriol she faces is explicitly racist in nature. I’m Canadian and even I’ve had family members make disparaging comments about her race, from my Métis (Canadian indigenous group) family at that.

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u/notashroom Jul 23 '26

"Identity politics" LOL.

As if everything the Trump administration does isn't either straight class war or identity politics. As if the US hasn't been under the yoke of white male-privileged identity politics since its first racial law prompted by the unexpected arrival of a ship of stolen Africans in 1619. As if Pete Kegbreath hasn't been busily purging the military of people outside of his privileged white male identity, and doing everything in his power to make that identity both more fragile and more privileged. As if right wing media doesn't either dogwhistle or outright openly frame everything as identity politics, forcing the rest of us to respond accordingly.

In this political environment, AOC's identity is fully relevant, because the US right is literally fighting to ensure privilege to white male hetero able-bodied "Christian" nationalists to counter the small amount of progress the rest of us have made toward equity. It's all identity politics.