Barack Obama's America

August 27, 2014


-Grunt-cough

-(I ignore it).

-Grunt-cough

-Stop doing that now.

-Stop doing what?!  Because I COUGHED?!

-It's 5:30 in the morning.

-You psychotic dumb-a-- b----!  Are you sick in the head?!  You need to see a psychiatrist!  You need to spend the day talking to a psychologist!  You stupid b----!

That is a conversation that took place this morning, between a homeless guest who is in her twenties and me, at the Pine Street Inn.  She continued to talk in the way I have described while I silently took the sheets off my bed to put in the dorm laundry cart and then went to the staff person in the dormitory.

I told the staff person that the young woman had done the coughing harassment last night and this morning.  The staff person, an older woman, smiled at me as if I were being silly and said "Coughing," in a quietly admonishing way, as if I were upset over nothing.  I told her "I told (the young woman) to stop and then she called me a dumb-a--, psychotic b----.  She's been harassing me for weeks."

I went to the lobby.  The supervisor of this shift is someone whom I have known to be unhelpful in the past.  While considering what to do next, I went to the restroom to brush my teeth.  The young woman walked into the restroom and called me a psycho.

I went to the office and waited outside the door.  The supervisor, who was in the office, looked at me and rubbed her nose and then walked away, before I had said a word.  A staff person who was outside the office said to the supervisor "Lena would like to talk to you," because she had seen me waiting.  Angrily, the supervisor said "What does she want?"  Then she looked at the other staff person and said "Talk to her; she's staff."  Then the supervisor left the office to do something else.

I told the staff person that the homeless guest had done "the coughing thing" last night and this morning.  The staff person started to say "People can't always help coughing," and I said "I know that's the standard line; she also called me a psychotic b---- when I told her to stop.  She's been hassling me for weeks."  The staff person said "All right.  I'll talk to her."

The young woman would not have acted the way she has, and there wouldn't have been more denial of the situation by staff and, by the supervisor, more sexual harassment, if President Obama hadn't joined the celebrities, media, corporations, and everyone else who was degrading women in 2010, if the conglomerate hadn't then formed into a mob in 2010 because of his participation, and if he hadn't continued to promote gender discrimination and bullying, lying and victim-blaming.

I was fortunate that the staff person who said she would speak to the young woman is usually a nice person; there are staff at the Pine Street Inn who would have talked over everything I said, screaming at me.

I am sure that the situation that happened this morning at the Pine Street Inn happens in many forms, thousands of times every day, all over the world, because of the conglomerate.


Copyright L. Kochman, August 27, 2014 @ 6:25 a.m.