The internet revived a 2021 Tucker Carlson interview with JD Vance last week, to much negative attention, in which the current Republican vice presidential contender identified the illness plaguing America. According to Mr. Vance, the issue was that the nation was effectively ruled “by our corporate oligarchs, via the Democrats, by a bunch of childless cat ladies.” Despite having two stepchildren, Vice President Kamala Harris was included in the list of those named. Mr. Vance believed that additional “cat ladies” and associated malcontents “live in one-bedroom apartments in New York City,” while Ms. Harris resides on the grounds of the US Naval Observatory. “They have an obsession with what they do. They have no “direct stake” in the future of the country, are fixated on their wealth and fortunes, and “hate normal Americans for choosing family over these ridiculous D.C. and New York status games.”
In actuality, when it comes to some of these choices, the “normal Americans” he extols are not all that far from the urban feminist class. For several years, fertility rates have been dropping nationwide; in West Virginia and Montana, they are about as low as they are in New York and Connecticut. But Mr. Vance said it was the “miserable cat lady” who should have stopped dumping her sorrow “on the rest of the country,” presumably drowning in her billable hours and coming home to an uninterested American bobtail and a fridge full of Spindrift. The framing relied on a centuries-old cliche, putting aside the novelty of wealthy, power-hungry, overachievers living in one-bedroom apartments: the idea that female liberty is both a hazardous civic unraveling and a form of self-regarding blindness. Childless women are a concern. More than that, women who consciously choose to choose pets over children are unstable. However, why and when were cats involved, drawn in to support our sexist cultural criticisms and strangely overused as a representation of unbridled social authority and female despair and loneliness?
Both parties have expressed displeasure over Mr. Vance’s statements
“I’ve been following JD Vance’s development over the past few years and was disgusted by the remark both then and now,” stated Alyssa Farah Griffin, a former Trump administration official and Republican strategist who currently co-hosts “The View.” But a lot of the women in my life—left, right, and center—are only now realizing this and are repulsed by it. It is disrespectful to imply that women who are childless are less valuable in society. Conservative commentator Meghan McCain, who is the daughter of Senator John McCain, stated on social media that Mr. Vance’s remarks would hurt people who don’t want their reproductive status discussed or evaluated at all or who have to undergo fertility treatments to start a family.
She remarked, “I’ve been trying to warn every conservative man I know.” “Women on all sides are becoming more active as a result of these JD remarks, including my most conservative friends who support Trump. These remarks are fundamentally anti-Christian and have hurt many. We are not like this.
“There is nothing intrinsically wrong with women or cats”
There are some meanings associated with the insult “cat lady” in particular. “You are physically unattractive, or a workaholic, which makes you a deviant person; no wonder you have a pet cat because that’s the only one who loves you,” Tanenbaum states. Tell that to all the Swift fans who purchased tickets for her ground-breaking Eras tour and started responding to Vance’s remarks on social media. “I’ve enjoyed the memes that people have been responding with. Fatima Goss Graves, head of the National Women’s Law Center Action Fund, adds, “It seems to me that people involved in this campaign are feeling a lot of joy and promise.” They’re letting the cruelty of those sorts of remarks roll off and responding with a lot of joy, reminding people that there’s nothing wrong with cats and there’s nothing wrong with women.”
Still, it’s serious business for young children. “These types of messages tell young girls to limit their aspirations to only being a wife and a mother,” Carr explains. “For females who desire other types of success, these messages communicate that, ‘despite your achievements and sacrifices for your career, none of that matters because you are not a mother.'”
“How can you be ‘childless’ when you have cutie pie kids like Cole and me?”
Supporters of Harris were eager to point out that all US presidents have been men, and none of them had ever given birth physically. A few have also never given birth to any children. The most notable of them was George Washington, the nation’s first president, who, like Harris, assisted in raising the children of his ex-spouse. The late Republican senator John McCain’s daughter, Meghan McCain, issued a warning, saying that Vance’s remarks “are activating women across all sides, including my most conservative Trump-supporting friends.” The attention on politicians’ kids coincides with the election’s emphasis on reproductive health and access to abortion, issues that Harris has long supported.
“Political figures ought to have kids. Venture entrepreneur and former congressional candidate Blake Masters, who had Trump’s endorsement, commented on X, “It is appropriate that they get married.” “If you aren’t running or can’t run a household of your own, how can you relate to a constituency of families or govern wisely concerning future generations?” he replied. Vance even went so far as to propose that parents ought to have increased voting rights in a speech from 2021. According to remarks he provided to the Washington Post, “if you don’t have as much of an investment in the future of this country, maybe you shouldn’t get nearly the same voice when you go to the polls as a parent in this country; you should have more power.” Since then, Vance’s campaign has called the remarks a “thought experiment.”