'I am ashamed': Beto apologizes for 'demeaning comments about women'

[DonViejo]

Source: Politico



By ALEX ISENSTADT 10/01/2018 05:54 PM EDT Updated 10/01/2018 09:00 PM EDT

Texas Senate candidate Beto O’Rourke is apologizing for once criticizing a Broadway musical with actresses “whose only qualifications seem to be their phenomenally large breasts and tight buttocks.”

In 1991, the 19-year-old O’Rourke reviewed the Broadway musical “The Will Rogers Follies” for the Columbia Daily Spectator, the university’s student newspaper. Writing under the byline Robert O’Rourke, he panned the performance as “one of the most glaring examples of the sickening excesses and moral degradations of our culture.”

He went on to bemoan the bevy of “perma-smile actresses whose only qualifications seem to be their phenomenally large breasts and tight buttocks.”

The review in the Oct. 10, 1991, edition of the Spectator, which according to an archive search was the only article he wrote for the newspaper, offers another glimpse of the former life of the Texas Senate candidate, who has given Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) an unexpectedly serious reelection challenge. It also shows how drastically the sensitivities surrounding descriptions of women have changed over the past three decades: While it’s unclear whether O’Rourke was criticizing the musical’s use of scantily-clad women for effect or commenting on their bodies himself, his prose, in hindsight, is jarring either way.

Read more: https://www.politico.com/story/2018/10/01/beto-orourke-musical-review-855385

[7962]

1. UGH

[Hav]

2. Not as bad as one might fear from the headline

As the article already pointed out, times change. The kind of rhetoric that was acceptable 20 years ago regarding all kinds of topics would spark far more outrage nowadays.
It's also noteworthy that his comments weren't generally anti-women at all but were centered on the production, on how the actors/actresses were used. I think that is an important distinction.

That said, he needs every vote he can get in Texas and the slightest distraction from that hurts him.

[bucolic_frolic]

3. Attempts to turn literary prose into a "jarring" incident is Bizarre in the extreme

Madison Avenue shows the cleavage all the time. They should be called on it. 95% of people would not make stage or advertising eye candy. Yet they continue to hold it all over the rest of us.

Beto noticed the tease and what was happening. He didn't grope them.

[catbyte]

4. OH NOES! HE MUST WITHDRAW IMMEDIATELY!

If this is the worst thing that the Cruz campaign's oppo research can dig up about him, then that's pretty pathetic. He was 19 and reviewing a play, for crying out loud. I've seen clips of that show, and that's exactly the vibe they were going for. I can't believe he actually felt the need to apologize. I guess it's the right thing to do, but this woman thinks it's a ridiculous nothingburger.

Edited to add this:

[no_hypocrisy]

5. PC or not, that review does encapsulate

"The WRF".

Trivia: Donald Trump made a call and got his mistress, Marla Maples, a starring role in this musical.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

6. Beto has more adult years now than he had years of life then (27 years ago he was 19)

It would be a poor remark nowadays, but excessive focus on such peccadillos is counter-productive.

pecadillo (Spanish): minor sin. Has become used in English (spelled peccadillo) to emphasize the diminutiveness of a minor sin.

[Liberalagogo]

7. Give me a fucking break

This is a large breasted tight-buttocked NOTHINGburger.

[DeminPennswoods]

8. Dance ten, looks three

kind of sums it all up.

[justgamma]

10. A Chorus Line? n/t

[DeminPennswoods]

14. Yes

nt

[The Liberal Lion]

9. This is the trick that even during normal times the right is always willing to pull out

Namely, they take a minor transgression by their opponent and somehow try to equivocate it next to their horrendous sin. Let's take a a look at the cowardice of Ted Cruz and how this right wing trick applies here. The Cruz campaign releases this kind of oppo research (and it's fair to release it, it is politics after all) while ignoring the troubling allegations of sexual misconduct within it's own circle. If we circle this back on republicans and would ask something like about how they dismiss the misconduct of Roy Moore, Brett Kavanaugh, and of course that of the orange asshole as merely "boys will be boys", but then how can they incriminate a review of a play that perhaps inartfully said only "the play is using sex to sell it's tickets, but the performance, regardless of the sex sold, is still a poor one".

If these were more normal times I would say something like "we liberals and progressives have to stop falling into their equivocation trap". But these are not normal times. That being so I will say none of this matters anymore. I want O'Rourke to win, but in the end it doesn't matter. Why? Because, as many will find out, ridding our land of this pestilence known as the right wing will take far more effort than making it to the ballot box. Folks, this is a struggle. All is fair in love and war, and I have no love for a GOP'er right now. Zero. So that only leaves one path.

[LiberalLovinLug]

17. Of course they have a secret weapon which we do not have...

...ourselves!

They can always count on a small but vocal band of extremist PC cultists who self identify as Democrats to back them up. In fact, most times the GOP doesn't even have to lift much of a finger, just ride on their coat tails. Its great, they don't even have to do the dirty work. Reps like Gillibrand can do it for them.

[The Liberal Lion]

24. agreed

[LudwigPastorius]

12. "While it's unclear whether O'Rourke was criticizing the musical's use of scantily-clad women for...

effect or commenting on their bodies himself..."

No, it's really not that unclear.

There are only a few female roles in the show in which the performer's main function isn't parading around in revealing costumes. I read what he wrote as his reaction to that fact.

[MountCleaners]

20. I agree - COME ON!

THIS feminist has no problem with his cheeky comments.

[jgmiller]

13. I think he thought he was trying to defend women

I've seen that musical (and enjoyed it) and I think he was making a ham handed comment about how the musical and modern society doesn't uplift women but degrades them. I would argue that's an extreme response to a Broadway musical and he isn't a great review writer but I think he's appologizing and being trashed for saying the opposite of what everyone thinks.

[msongs]

15. broadway has always been about those two female attributes. nothing new here nt

[violetpastille]

26. I think Marla Maples was in production of WRF

This "criticism" seem pretty honest and well meant.
He's demeaning the show, not women.

[no_hypocrisy]

32. Here you go:

[violetpastille]

33. Ha Ha.

Thank you!

[blogslut]

16. The sauce is weak, Politico

[Novembrist]

18. HE HAD NOTHING TO APOLOGIZE FOR!

"...he panned the performance as “one of the most glaring examples of the sickening excesses and moral degradations of our culture.”

He went on to bemoan the bevy of “perma-smile actresses whose only qualifications seem to be their phenomenally large breasts and tight buttocks.”

He was SLAMMING the play's moral vapidity! But that doesn't matter now. He's punted the election by backing down, like Dems always do.



Bill Maher is gonna be ALL OVER THIS come Friday, and Bill Maher's gonna be right!

[maxsolomon]

19. Throw him on the pile with Al Franken

we must have purity.

[Dave Starsky]

21. And Ted Cruz, defender of independent womanhood...

Is such an attractive alternative.

The Russian trolls and bots aren't even trying anymore.

[maxsolomon]

22. i forgot the

which one would hope was obvious.

it would be pretty impressive to get to my post count as a troll or a bot.

[Dave Starsky]

23. It WAS obvious. I was agreeing with you.

I'm sorry that my sarcasm appeared to counter your sarcasm!

[maxsolomon]

25. oh man, what a day.

apologies as well.

[Dave Starsky]

28. Such is the world we live in now.

You literally cannot tell if anything news-related is real or a ridiculous joke.

[torius]

27. And Ted's Cruz main appeal

to his fans is... his amazingly phallic penis nose.

[Kashkakat v.2.0]

29. HUH? Its not a comment on "women," its a comment on some specific women who appeared to have been

chosen for physical attributes and not any other talent.

Theres no "there" there.

Now, I love a good apology as much as the next woman, but come on guys! Don't apologize unless theres something to apologize for.

And why "ashamed" ? Now that's a little over the top.