Perhaps you've heard of the group Women on 20s, which is seeking to replace Andrew Jackson on the $20 bill with a notable American female. The movement's been timed to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment, which, as most of you know, granted women the right to not have to murder their husbands in their sleep in order to have a vote.
The group has narrowed it down to 15 candidates, including Rosa Parks, Susan B. Anthony, Eleanor Roosevelt, Sojourner Truth and my main mamacita, Harriet Tubman.
So who'd have a problem with dedicating just one of the 12 kinds of U.S. paper currency to an historic, heroic, game-changing, ass-kicking chick from history? The boob-tards, that's who. Because after reading some of their responses to related articles on UTSanDiego.com, HuffingtonPost.com, Time.com and others, it's clear they'd prefer that this country remain a grumpy, old patriarchy whose penises shrivel at the thought of recognizing great women.
Take this comment on HuffPo from Arthur Greenfield: "[They are] just a bunch of dried up hags with nothing better to do," said the, um, dried-up stag trolling the internet because he has nothing better to do.
Take Ted Lorenzen, who, on U-TSanDiego.com, called the group "feminazis" and asked, "So is the logic here [to] throw a woman on the bill just because she is a woman?"
Um, no, Dr. Knuckledragger. The logic here is to end an era of putting only men on bills because only men are permitted to be on bills.
Take Tuff Gong, who wrote, "Paper money in the U.S. is reserved for past presidents only," which is a comment you'd expect from someone who's never seen a $100 bill, largely because his wages have been garnished for child support ever since he was old enough to knock up his cousins. News flash, Moneybags—Ben Franklin was never a president.
Then there's Garman Lord, who wrote, "How come the only women [that] feminists and politically correct Nazis ever admire are social agitators?" to which I say, "Yes, yes, so true! The female candidates on this list really are pesky social agitators who agitated so many grand American institutions, such as segregation, child labor, sweatshops, environmental sodomy, gay bashing, domestic abuse and voting exclusivity.
Speaking of political correctness, this was the beef most often cited by the clods on the comment boards. Now, I'm no fan of political correctness, either, but there's good PC and there's bad PC. For instance, abolishing slavery was a politically correct move, but I think we can all agree it was the correct politically correct move. Bad PC tends to be about controlling how people express themselves. An example of bad PC is the soon-to-arrive hate mail that will demand my being fired for having written "chick" and "bitch" even though they were both preceded by "ass-kicking" and clearly meant as a compliment.
Good PC is about spreading awareness and fairness through inclusion. It does not prohibit or marginalize. The Women on 20s movement is not trying to exclude straight, white males from representation on money, nor browbeating anyone who venerates them. It's just saying, "For crissake, give a girl her due, willya?"
It should be noted that while featuring a female on the $20 bill is their stated goal, what they really want is for all of us to learn a little more about the candidates. Because they truly are heroes who deserve our gratitude and respect, such as the aforementioned Rosa "The Rumbler" Parks, Susan "Be Asskicking" Anthony, Eleanor "Ain't No Rigby" Roosevelt and Sojourner "Tell 'em the Motherfucking" Truth.
Such as Rachel Carson, who fostered the creation of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and a nationwide ban on several Earth-raping pesticides. Such as Clara Barton, the magnanimous "Angel of the Battlefield," who treated injured soldiers on the front line of the Civil War and founded the Red Cross. Such as Alice Paul, who parlayed hunger strikes and prison sentences into real, true, actual change, that being the right for women not to have to murder their husbands in their sleep in order to vote. Such as that slavery-born Harriet Tubman, who escaped captivity and then—instead of hiding in a cave and living off beetles and worms forever (which is what I would have done)—returned 13 times to rescue 70 families via the Underground Railroad. To hell with balls, that took some clit! I mean, compare her street cred to that of Andrew Jackson.
· Andrew Jackson was the seventh president of the United States—yawn.
· Andrew Jackson worked in the Revolutionary War as a courier—ho hum.
· He helped establish the state of Tennessee—a state so insignificant, the letter E is still trying to secede.
· Five words: "Indian Removal Act of 1830." Better yet, one word: "genocide."
And if all that wasn't enough to get your ass booted off the 20, just remember that President Andrew "Wow You are Such a Douche" Jackson owned more than 100 slaves. Think about that for a moment. These boobs believe that Andrew Jackson—the man who kidnapped, brutalized and denied the most basic rights to 100 human souls—deserves to be on our money more than then the smoking-hot, heroic, ass-kicking, game-changing personification of selflessness and courage that is Ms. Harriet "Hell Hath no Fury" Tubman. Bugger off with that noise.
Write to ed@sdcitybeat.com and editor@sdcitybeat.com. Edwin Decker blogs at www.edwindecker.com. Follow him on Twitter @edwindecker or find him on Facebook.
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