"Grab them by the pussy," he said.
Look, I'm not a baby. I've heard people say obnoxious things; for Christ's sake, I've stood behind a bar five nights a week since I was 21. I've said obnoxious things. Sometimes I think I was born with my foot in my mouth.
But beyond the overall crassness of the comments there's something else about it that bugs me. And I'm not quite sure why.
"Grab them by the pussy.”
Not "grab their pussy" or even "grab the pussy." I'm not saying those constructions are markedly better or more acceptable. But I do at least basically understand the words.
But "grab them BY THE pussy?"
There's something there that I find uniquely disturbing. Maybe I'm making something out of nothing significant, given the overall tenor of his remarks.
By the addition of those two words, "by the," for some reason hit a uniquely disturbing note with me.
There's a weird separation there. A way of distancing. He's not grabbing their most personal parts. He's grabbing someone BY their most personal parts.
It sounds oddly cold, calculating, like he's discussing an object and not a person.
It also sounds violent, more violent than the act that I think he's describing. "Grab them by the pussy." And do what? He's going to grab them by their most private parts and drag them away, like some cartoon caveman with a club? Maybe I'm nuts, but that is literally the mental picture the remark summons for me.
I realize that asking if I'm nuts is a basically a redundant question but does anybody else react to that particular use of language the way I do? It literally makes me cringe.
"Grab them BY THE pussy."