I’m way late on this story about Chuck Schumer calling a flight attendant a “bitch”, mostly because I didn’t feel any need to point out that it’s really not so great of a man to fling that word at women to put them in their place. Like Tracy Clark-Flory pointed out, it’s hard to even get that outraged, because the word “bitch” is flung around so often that you get numb, which creates this weird irony, because when a man calls you a bitch, he usually wants it to sting really bad, and it doesn’t have that power because it’s used so much. So, I skipped it. But M. LeBlanc has pulled me back in with her wily blogging ways. She’s linked to Michael Wolff, no doubt thinking he’s being daring, talking about how Schumer is some kind of hero for calling some poor woman who works shitty hours for low pay a bitch.
Amongst his many sins against common sense, Wolff blows off the word “bitch” as a “mild epithet”, which Matt calls him out for. Like I said before, when a man flings it at you, it’s quite clear that it’s anything but mild—-he usually wants it to hurt bad, and is less than pleased if you’re numb to it. (Which is why “cunt” is often flung in its stead, to keep the misogyny fresh.) But this is mild compared to some of the crazed shit that Wolff says, while pissing on those less fortunate than he.
Among the worst things you can do in upper-middle-class, politically-correct, don’t-call-attention-to-yourself culture is insult a service person. This is counter-intuitive because one of the things that is most often done in upper-middle-class culture is complain about service.
Presumably, we are to laugh at this tendency of people to think it’s less than noble to lash out at people who make very little money to put up with your bullshit. Because, as Wolff will explain, sometimes the help isn’t being submissive and apologetic enough for continuing to have sentience while waiting on you.
But the arrogance and entitlement of a United States senator is no more probable then the petty tyrannies, surly dismissiveness, and automaton-like manner of a flight attendant. Such contempt has only increased with 9/11-inspired laws that make looking cross-eyed at airline personnel an imprisonable offense.
And this is where he demonstrates why we need rules like, “Don’t just snap at the stewardess because she’s doing her damn job.” Because people like Wolff are childish, and like children, will blame the person closest to them instead of the person responsible for their pain. The flight attendant has to tell you to turn off your cell phone, asshole. Believe you and me, she wishes more than you probably do that this wasn’t a rule, and therefore she didn’t have to enforce it on snotty people who blame her, due to their childishness. Because you can’t tell the difference between the person responsible for the rule and the person who has to enforce it, we have have rules of etiquette to save you from yourself.
There are two points here. The smaller one has to do with the idiotic notion that cell phones might interfere with airline systems, which everybody knows (or strongly suspects) is bogus. The larger one is an odd conceit that it is somehow rude, domineering, and unnecessary, to quibble about the service you’re getting—that if you do, you are obviously way too entitled.