There is one female the whole world was talking about the latter week named Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. The powerful speech of the New York congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was breaking the internet. Also known by her initials AOC, she addressed the verbal dispute with Republican congressman Ted Yoho on the House floor.
A quick recap: Last Monday Ted Yoho confronted AOC on the steps of the US Capitol, calling the congresswoman “disgusting” for her latest statements. As Mr. Yoho was walking away, he was overheard by reporters calling Ocasio-Cortez a “f***ing bitch”.
AOC gave her master 10 minutes speech where she addressed sexism and the fact that seniors like Yoho often get away by simply stating that they are decent family men talking about their dearly beloved wives and daughters, as this supposedly melts the hearts of the people.
“I am someone‘s daughter, too,” Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez remarked. This was the only time in her speech where she got emotional swallowing her tears silently as her father passed away. Note the fact that she delivered her speech with exceptional professionalism as women are always judged for being too emotional when speaking in public. Ironically, men are never criticized for being neither angry nor cynical, let alone furious or horrified.
Following the incident, Ted Yoho resigned from the board of Christian organization.
It is highly likely that Alexandria‘s speech started a new wave of women empowerment movement with Instagram‘s #womenempoweringwomen challenge.
Alexandria‘s speech gave me chills.
All of us, young professional females, young female interns, experienced specialists or managers, professionals of the highest rank, all of us can relate to each and every word of her speech.
We all have been there. We all stood and politely smiled when a senior male was telling us that he simply knows better. He has seen a lot and he has vast experience. And yet, we, young females in our early thirties are just full of big ideas and crazy ambitions. They actually know how things work and they feel superior.
Her story reminded me of one of the hundred similar situations I experienced myself.
I remember sitting in a fancy corporate office of an internationally known company with craftily designed politically correct LinkedIn posts presenting females of colour creating the image of diversity and inclusiveness. I have been sitting there as a new recruit listening to my manager, 20 years senior to me, telling me that I do not know anything.
According to him, my prior work experience was worth zero, and maybe after five years in the company I will be able to give some sort of decent input, but until when my knowledge was worth nothing. He felt he could interrupt me in the middle of my presentations, criticize my looks or tone of voice. The continuous comments making me feel like worthless clearly affected my confidence but I escalated the issue to the ones who needed to hear this. Little did I know that I was not the first one being victimized by this person. Guess what the other females in this role did? They kept on leaving this position not being able to work due to the ongoing bullying from the manager. I was the last in the circle, I was brought to tell my story to the highest heads of the company until the person was finally taken away from the position after years of diminishing young great talents. My colleagues were patting my shoulder impressed with my courage. I thought what I did was natural, I knew my rights and the values of the company and I knew that neither me nor any other female on this planet should be treated as less worthy and experience the abuse of power in the workplace.
Though I was a newly recruited young specialist the ongoing cases of females escalating the issue finally made a proper case to take this person down from his position. And what if I would have kept silent? What if I would have gone home and actually believed in the words making me feel as if all my knowledge and skills which actually got me that job meant nothing? What if I kept silent? What if AOC would have not escalated the incident?
Just as AOC described, she politely said to the congressman that he was being rude. He got furious hearing this. As she said, there was nothing conversational about their dispute, she was walking up the stairs when he came forward and verbally attacked her. It is common that females that we simply mind our own business, do our work, yet the senior males think they have a right to negatively attack us. They do not start conversations like us: “Do you have a minute?” “Are you interested to hear some feedback?” “Are you interested to hear my opinion?” Instead, the senior males assume they are so superior that all the young professional females should listen to their opinions, which most likely, confront the ones of the young females. They think they should be heard and praised.
This is what we females do, we silently stand and listen to a senior male insulting us and afterwards make a polite remark that is kind of behaviour is unacceptable. This makes a senior mare furious! Talking back is clearly unacceptable! They are so experienced and of such high profile, clearly, their input and feedback are needed no matter whether we are interested to hear it or not.
We, the females of 2020 refuse to be victimized, we refuse to stand in silence while being insulted. We have to talk about it, escalate it and go public if needed. We have to do this for ourselves, for our female colleagues, for the future interns and students, for our nieces and daughters. We have to do this for the future generation as this has to stop. Every single woman who speaks up matters. Thank you Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez for inspiring hundreds of thousands of females across the globe.
