I saw something in a facebook comment yesterday that immediately and instinctively evoked what I’ll conservatively refer to as a negative reaction. It was about members of the coronavirus Task Force and the comment was posted during the live briefing. I tried to let it die in the cluttered recesses of my mind, but it was literally the first thing that came to me when I woke up this morning – much too early. So, in an effort to get a full night’s rest tonight, I’m hoping that writing about it will lead to sleeping in just a bit later tomorrow morning.
Here’s the sleep stealing comment:
“They must be doctor shopping, Fauci, gone, surgeon general home., the lady doctor no longer smiles. She must be on her way out”
Pushing past the primary school level punctuation, I wondered if I was the only one reading this thread who noticed that Fauci was referred to by name and the Surgeon General was referred to by title, but the “lady” doctor was referred to by neither and – although the briefing was packed with nearly two hours of content including her taking a turn at the microphone multiple times – this guy’s comment about her was that she wasn’t SMILING.
Because when you brief the press about a global pandemic, you need to smile.
Like all the men standing on the dais with you.
Stifling my inner Red Foreman, my mind went next to the part of this video about one minute in:
“Do it again, but just this time try it a bit more…smiley.”
“You want me to s-smile?”
“yeah. Just, you know, more…leading lady.”
“The scene gets quite tragic…”
“So?”
I thought about replying to the comment, but judging by the content of the other comments and replies I already saw and how fast they were being posted (including the bird finger emoji above the lady doctor comment), I had a strong sense that anything positive I might have to say about the “lady” doctor would be of no more interest to this person than her actual name.
Which is Deborah Birx.
And while the commenter was correct in assuming she is a doctor, he also could have referred to her by one of her other titles, like (retired Army) Colonel or Ambassador.
“Birx was nominated by President Barack Obama as United States Global AIDS Coordinator and confirmed by the Senate; she was sworn in April 4, 2014.”
Wikepedia
Before she was confirmed as an Ambassador under the Obama Administration, Birx served as the Director of CDC’s Division of Global HIV/AIDS from 2005-2014. From 1996-2005, she served as the Director of the U.S. Military HIV Research Program at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research.
But according to this particular pundit, she and everyone else on the Task Force “have no clue.”
Maybe the people who actually know this guy in real life wouldn’t view his comment about the “lady” doctor not smiling as misogynistic.
But I don’t know him. And this comment – on a PUBLIC facebook post, where anyone can read it – is all I know about him. He summed it up well with his last comment:
