AOC & The ‘Mr Big’ Factor

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

Again, let me be completely clear — I only keep writing about this because it’s fun-interesting and, given how dire the national news is right now, it’s nice, for once, to have a completely ridiculous story that makes me smile instead of want to walk off into the nears river, never to be seen again.

So, having said that, let’s continue to look into the no-win situation that the lovely and talented Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez finds herself in when it comes to some pretty basic things about her life and who she is. As an aside, I just noticed that the top autocomplete for AOC on Google is a search for bikini pictures of her, so it’s not quite as “sad” as Blue Check Liberals might have to believe for the average person to be interested in such stuff.

This, of course, leads into the general issues that I want to talk about. First, there have to be pictures of AOC in a bikini, somewhere. Unless she had the foresight to contact everyone she’s known the last decade and purge all photographic evidence of her being in a bikini out of existence, such pictures exist and they’re going to come out.

Furthermore, the more she draws attention to herself and the more the Right has a big old boner for her, it’s not going to take much mental energy for the insane Right, which is both physically attracted to her and repulsed by her policy views to go from, “I’d date that girl,” to…”Wait, who IS she dating?”

Now, let’s address all of this. The internal logic of the Right is something along these lines: “Because THEY will take her less seriously if they’re bikini pictures of her, then of course EVERYONE will take her less seriously if there are bikini pictures of her.”

And, so, they set themselves up to be self-owned AGAIN. Yes, whenever such pictures come out there will be a national debate on female politicians, a gross double standard and the changing nature of women in American society. But after things calm down a little bit, the center-Left will make fun of the Right for obviously lusting after AOC and the center-Right will believe they’ve finally proven that AOC is just “Sandy” from the block and as such shouldn’t be, in anyway, taken seriously or heard from again.

I, for one, believe barring something really, really unexpected, we’re going to hear a lot from AOC over the next 20 years and beyond.

Now, we come to a very delicate situation that I like to think of as “The Mr. Big Factor.” It goes something like this — as AOC profile increases and we learn one way or another if she’s dating anyone or not (I mean, is she? Is this common knowledge and I don’t know about it? That’s possible. I just checked her Wiki profile and….nada. No mention of a boyfriend.) there’s a good chance things could get a little surreal.

If she’s NOT dating anyone right now, then a lot of “Mr. Bigs” will see her as the ultimate arm candy and begin to swarm her. And, here’s where it gets surreal — a lot of them could be extremely conservative older middle-age men who completely disagree with her political views.

Then is when we’ll know if she’s The Real Thing or not. If she manages to curve their advances and find, say, someone like Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey as her date to major events, then we’ll know she’s in it to win it. But if she turns around and dates some asshole MAGA Wall Street jerkoff, then, well, there’s that.

The point of all of this is — she needs to get ahead of this. That’s all I’m saying. That’s the only advice I might give her. She’s doing a great job otherwise and I’m beginning to enjoy her policy views. Shrug. It’s not really my place one way or another, but I do hope her the best and it seems as though only by addressing the issues that I have set forth now on a proactive basis instead of waiting for some incel to try to do a gotcha on her that things will work out for the best long-term.

But what do I know, I lead a “sad” life for even talking about all of this in the first place.



This Is Why We Got Trump: AOC’s Romantic Status & Blue Check Twitter Liberalism

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

It appears to me the following is happening: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez presently politically inhabits a nether region where she’s a Leftist darling and a Rightist bugbear. Where the Left sees the future and a strong, intelligent Latina who is the future of the movement, the Right sees an ignorant bimbo Communist that they not-so-secretly collectively lust after.

And then there’s the center.

So, I suspect that soon, very soon, like after the 60 Minutes interview scheduled for tomorrow (Sunday) as I write this, she will be introduced to a much more centrist audience who will see her in a whole different light. They’ll be intrigued that such a young, affable, attractive young woman is also growing into an ideology whose avatars are dusty old people.

As such, the dynamic may change dramatically. Things like her current romantic status, which the Left thinks you’re “sad” for even being interested in in the first place will suddenly be something that a housewife in middle America might honestly and sincerely be interested in on a basic human level.

Now, this brings up something that really, really bugs the shit out of me. Blue Check Liberals on Twitter are the absolute worst when it comes to putting you on blast if you tweet anything to them that doesn’t fit their rigid ideological orthodoxy. So, when it occurred to me yesterday that I did not know an otherwise basic political question, “What is AOC’s relationship status right now?” and I asked that question in a harmless manner, I got piled on by a couple of Blue Check Twitter Liberals who were aghast aghast! that I would even entertain such a question.

I have no idea what is going to happen in the near future, but whenever I find myself getting angry over that little kerfuffle, I console myself by holding out hope that today’s “sad” question, might be tomorrow’s “duh” question.

In other words, AOC can’t stay in the public eye with the intensity that she’s experiencing right now without the question of her relationship status coming up. And if you want to jump down my throat for asking why it matters, my response is being in politics as a woman is a different experience than that for a man and add to the equation that AOC is demonstrably hot, then it’s not QUITE so “sad” to broach the subject of her romantic status.

And if you still are unhappy with me, I would like to observe that it’s self-evident that modern American politics for women isn’t, like rainbows and unicorns and free bleeding, you fucktwit.

In other words — AOC is hot enough that your typical heterosexual dude, regardless of political orientation, would take one look at her and at least entertain the notion of what it would be like to date her.

And, as such, we enter the nebulous realm of gender politics that is so nuanced that if you’re an ideologue at the extreme of either end of the political spectrum, you’re likely to give a rather ham-handed approach.

So, what I’m suggesting is it’s likely that by the end of 2019, my sincere question about her romantic status which Blue Check Twitter Liberals this is so “sad” is going to be extremely mainstream and, I would even go so far to suggest, something of a parlor sport for armchair political observers….that you find on Twitter.

Or maybe not. I am “sad” after all.

Things Might Get A Little Surreal Politically With AOC Going Forward

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

I only keep talking about this because it’s, for once, a fun-interesting thing to think about where nobody gets hurt and it gives me something to chuckle about instead of feel sad.

So, as I articulated in a 20 minute video, here’s what going on with the Right’s growing boner over Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. AOC drives your typical MAGA person completely insane with her political views and as such they attack her every chance they get. Because Right Wing media is getting epic engagement from their readers whenever they mention her name, they are goaded into talking about her every chance they can get.

This, in turn, is observed by the Left and her overall power grows and grows and grows.

And, yet, there’s something really comical happening I’ve noticed that is worth noting — for a certain segment of MAGA it’s probably going to grow difficult for them not to notice that AOC is, on a strictly physical level, a babe. So, there’s at least the possibility that there will be a small, but vocal subset of MAGA who hates AOC’s politics with a white hot passion while at the same time lusting after her physically.

It gets rather surreal because MAGA believes that by definition you can’t take a hot woman seriously, while the Left can’t process that the issue of her physical attractiveness would be an issue at all.

And, so, the two sides, as always will be so far apart that they will stare at each other in disbelief. But maybe I’m wrong. Maybe this isn’t going to happen. But the conditions, at least, for something like what I suggest might happen, are there.

I guess we’ll see going forward.

V-Log: The Right’s Boner For AOC

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

It appears the Right has a growing boner for Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. It definitely will be interesting — and a bit surreal — to see how that dynamic plays out going forward. This breezy v-log is long, but interesting and pretty good in my opinion. It’s worth your time, if nothing else.

AOC As Cultural Icon

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

America doesn’t really know what to do with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. She’s a cultural anomaly in modern American politics on a number of different levels. As the Right continues to attack her for any reason simply because they’re completely scared shitless of her and their base gives them high engagement by simply mentioning her, she’s likely to become that rarest of political events — someone who stands squarely at the intersection of culture, politics and the national zeitgeist.

Only a few people — men — in our history have enjoyed such a historic stage and, they, too, all go by their name brand initials — TR, FDR, JFK. Now, here’s where things get interesting. I’m a dude, but I’m old enough to at least have the vaguest understanding of the different cultural worlds than men and women inhabit.

Women, at least it seems, often take cultural and fashion cues from other women that men don’t of men. So, while I’m not going to propose that I have any particular insight into the female mind, history would indicate that AOC has at least the potential to be an enormous cultural touchstone for many young women over the next 20 odd years (or more.)

This causes me to again observe that as of the moment, AOC’s relationship status is a black box. I like to think I’m fairly well informed about politics, culture and celebrity and I am completely unaware of AOC romantic status. I don’t know if she’s gay, straight, bi or pan. She’s a complete romantic enigma.

By even mentioning that, all I’m saying is AOC can’t continue to get the amount of ironic thirsty attention from the Right without some Right wing nimrod asking the same kind of questions I’m asking but in a much nasty manner and with a political agenda that is completely opposite to my own.

This will happen because women — and their romantic / sexual availability — is such a basic feature of humanity, that it’s inevitable that AOC will become a defacto sex symbol despite her best efforts not to. I’m well aware that it goes completely against everything she’s working for, but, like, uhhh, are we supposed to turn off 100,000 years of human evolutionary psychology because we are afraid people won’t take AOC “seriously?”

On second thought — don’t answer that.

Regardless, the whole point is — we’re careening towards a cultural tipping point when the simple question I’m asking, “Is AOC dating anyone?” will start to bounce around the media-celebrity industrial complex. I would not be surprised if Jezebel or The Cut at some point attempt to will into existence a romance between AOC and Sen. Cory Booker.

Anyway, as I was saying, there’s at least the possibility that AOC will, in a few years, be what everyone wanted HRC to be. It may take AOC a little bit longer than we’d hope, but it might very well happen. It might happen in large part because the Right in its own twisted manner, has a huge boner for AOC and they can’t help themselves talking about her the more it sinks in she’d probably be fun to “date.” (That’s cultural dog whistle for MAGA bro’s if ever there was one.)

But what do I know. My life is “sad” just for bringing this up in the first place.

Sick Sad World — Watch Me Be Even Sadder As I Make A Gentle Observation About AOC

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

Let me get some things out of the way. Apparently simply even having the question of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s romantic status enter your mind is some sort of taboo because it devalues her ability and leadership as a young, strong Latina.

So, I guess me simply make a gentle suggestion makes me even sadder and pathetic — she needs to get ahead of this issue. Men have been oppressing women since the Earth Mother was replaced by Yahweh so, like, I don’t think me simply observing that it’s odd that the general public doesn’t know her romantic status should be THAT big a deal.

Anyway, as I’ve said before, obviously this is an unstated taboo of some sort right now and as such I’m either ahead of the curve a little bit or just a pathetic looser.

Why does it even matter? It matters because the world sucks. And of all the shitty aspects of modern public life, being an attractive, smart and controversial woman pol in Trump’s America has got to suck the fucking worst.

Anyway, thankfully most people think I’m a crank, so it’s not like anyone is going to notice I did this follow up post unless I draw attention to it.

This Is Weird: Why Don’t I Know If AOC is Dating Anyone?

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

Editor’s Note: Apparently I have a “sad” life for asking this question. Maybe? I just think if she’s going to be a viable political figure going forward the question of her romantic status will grow in importance. Yes, it would be under a significantly different context for a man, but modern politics fucking sucks, especially for a woman. Apparently, this particular aspect of her life is going to be taboo or something until something happens.

Let’s be honest — no one can look and act like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez without the public knowing in excruciating detail her exact relationship status. I mean, fuck, people, I’m surprised I don’t know when she’s ovulating given how quickly she’s beginning to permeate pop culture.

Add to that that we’ve not seen what surely is out there — more than a few sizzling pictures of her in a bikini — and it all seems rather odd. Is she dating someone? Who was the last guy / girl she dated? Why did they break up if they’re not dating now? And it is dubious at best to think a woman like her living in the NYC area working as a bartender hasn’t had her fair share of boyfriends over the course of the recent past.

I say this knowing damn well these questions wouldn’t be asked of a man — or if they were, they would be asked much later in his career — but she’s young, affable, smart and demonstrably gorgeous. Add to the mix her political trajectory looks like it’s going to be about as high as you can get, and you’d think in this surreal nexus of politics and celebrity that we now live in that TMZ, People or BuzzFeed wouldn’t have a least poked around in that part of her life so people like me would know off the top of my head what her romantic status is.

Again, this is not so much what I want as the cold, cruel world of life in the spotlight. AOC is a babe — and smart — so while incels are busy ranting about her dance movies, I’ve simply noticed the absence of what is basic information that the average high information voter such as myself would know without thinking about.

Going forward, this is probably going to grow in importance. The longer she stays in the public eye, the sooner we’re going to see a bikini picture of her and there will be a great hue and cry about What Does It All Mean. I, for once, believe as women grow in political power, we’re all just going to have to deal with the fact that young, attractive women, like, huh, like to be in bikinis?

It’s not like she’s done porn, though, honestly, that, too is a dumb taboo going forward. In about 20 years, a lot of those young women in YouPorn videos are going to start thinking about going into politics and we’re all just going to have to accept that Porn Exists.

I have to note that really the interesting thing about AOC and other liberal women in office is that they really go against the script when it comes to powerful female pols. Usually, to be successful, a woman has to be physically unattractive and extremely conservative.

But times and expectations are changing, so buckle up, folks. AOC in 20 years is probably going to run for president and the way things are going — win.

Shelton Bumgarner is a writer and photographer living in Richmond, Va. He is writing his first novel. He may be reached at migukin (at) gmail (dot) com.

V-Log: The Death Of Gawker & The Village Voice Has Opened A Window Of Opportunity In New York City Media

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

It occurred to me over the weekend that if I lived in NYC and had the resources — which I do not — I could probably do something pretty cool in New York City’s media industry.