It’s election season in these United States of America, so you know that means that every Tom, Dick and Harry feels compelled to share their thoughts on politics, the state of the country and the potential candidates. Sometimes we get to hear from thoughtful, well-informed individuals and sometimes…sometimes we get to hear from Clifford Joseph Harris, Jr., a.k.a. T.I. Mr. Harris is a well-known rapper, businessman, criminal and family man, but I guess at no point along his journey to becoming any of those things did he learn about feminism, misogyny or the
general and proven ability of women to run the world. He couldn’t have because when asked his
thoughts on former First Lady of the United States of America, former Senator, former Secretary of State, and current Democratic candidate for President, Hillary Clinton, he gave the world this gem:

“Not to be sexist [read: to be very sexist] but, I can’t vote for the leader of the free world to be a woman…Just because, every other position that exists, I think a woman could do well. But the President? It’s kinda like, I just know that women make rash decisions emotionally – they make
very permanent, cemented decisions – and then later, it’s kind of like it didn’t happen, or they didn’t mean for it to happen. And I sure would hate to just set off a nuke. [Other leaders] will not be able to negotiate the right kinds of foreign policy; the world ain’t ready yet. I think you might be able to the Loch Ness Monster elected before you could [get a woman].”*

Shaking my head. There’s just so much that can be said, but in the interest of space and
your time I’ll just say a few things. First, it really doesn’t matter who he would vote for because I’m pretty sure his felonious record prevents him from walking into a voting office and casting a
ballot for anyone. Second, I have to attack this idea that emotions are bad. To be clear, an emotion is a “natural instinctive state of mind deriving from one’s circumstances, mood, or relationships with others.” It’s true, Google says so. So everyone has emotions and these emotions are natural. Emotions have variety and can be the catalyst for good and bad things. Disappointment can make people work harder. Joy can encourage people to put a smile on someone else’s face. Anger
can cause people to fight. We have to remove this negative connotation from the word emotional because not all emotions are bad and not all emotions bring about nuclear catastrophes, Mr.
Harris. Third, I just have to address this nonsensical belief that women are
somehow more emotional than men. Maybe women show their emotions differently, but that doesn’t mean we’re some unreasonably emotional beings. In fact, I would venture to suggest that it has been over emotional men who have wreaked significant and devastating havoc on our world, not women. To date, men drunk off of the emotions of hate, greed, vengeance and anger have caused world wars; enslaved, murdered and raped millions; ruined the environment; caused world markets to fail; and stripped people of their culture. I could go on, but at this point is should be clear that Mr. Harris and other men worried about emotional women probably need to check their own emotional selves.

Now you know this is a sports blog, so I can’t close this thing out without talking about sports and the fabulous, emotionally healthy women who play them. In honor of misogynists everywhere, here are some emotional athletes and the great things they’ve accomplished, in spite of or because of their emotions. En-joy.

Here’s Missy Franklin crying like a little baby after she demolished world class swimmers in the 2012 Summer Olympics in London. Yup, cried her way to a gold medal.

Here’s Serena Williams shouting her way through a second round match of the 2015 French Open. I guess all that frustration that she released sent her right to another Grand Slam trophy.

Maybe Ronda Rousey needs to tone down the anger here. Maybe not…she’s channeled that emotion all the way to an illustrious career as an undefeated, 4^th degree black belt MMA fighter.

Somebody probably should’ve told Veronica Campbell Brown to get up. All that thankfulness and gratefulness is over-the-top. She only won a gold medal in the 2008 Summer Olympic Games.
Geesh.

Lydia Ko’s looking pretty ecstatic. I guess that’s what happens when you win the Evian Championship and become the youngest female to win a major, and the youngest person to win a major in 147 years. No big deal.

Poor Marta, despite being the greatest female footballer of all time and 5 Time FIFA Player of the Year; she was heartbroken in Brazil’s loss to Australia in this year’s World Cup. Shouldn’t that woman just be grateful for all she’s already accomplished?

*Not surprisingly, after so many called Mr. Harris out for his boneheaded comments he tried to cha-cha slide his way into a lame twitter apology. I’m not buying it for one second, but you can read it here.