Oxford Apologizes to Cunningham [Updated]
UPDATED @ 5:32 PM: Part of the trouble with “She Said, She Said” beefs is that they can get pretty confusing pretty quickly. To clear things up, Jeanette Mott Oxford sent us an email making clear what she was — and was not — apologizing to Jane Cunningham for.
Antonio,
I hope it is clear that what I’m apologizing for is not meeting with Rep. Cunningham in advance and asking her to take the three steps in the press release I issued last week in that private session FIRST. I am taking no position on what really happened in her office. But I wish I had offered her a chance to say yes or no to those three steps before taking my case to the public.
Something about how the article from today is framed could lead one to believe I have accepted her side of the story. I still believe the students deserved a different response, a welcome. Even if she could not take time to meet with them that day, she could have invited them to write her with concerns. Being chair of that committee carries a responsibility to hear the witness of youths who have been bullied. And objections about how a young person’s fashion choices (if one chooses to voice them) could be stated in a manner that invites dialogue instead of language that shames that young person.
JMO
Jeanette Mott Oxford
State Representative, 59th District
Here’s our earlier story:
A Democratic legislator has apologized to one of her Republican colleagues after accusing her of disrespecting a group of teenagers attempting to lobby her support for an anti-bullying bill.
Last week, State Rep. Jeanette Mott Oxford (D-St. Louis) put out a press release claiming State Rep. Jane Cunningham (R-Chesterfield) refused to meet with students Desiree Bain and Austyn Langston of Jackson County because “she found their appearance very difficult to look at.” [Read our earlier story.]
Oxford, who did meet with the students, said they had multiple facial piercings and one had vividly colored hair. “Other than that they looked like regular teenagers to me,” Oxford said.
According to a press release for Oxford’s office, after refusing to meet with Langston and Bain, Rep. Cunningham told another group of students that “looking at these two young women was making her ill and that she didn’t understand why they hated themselves.”
Apparently that’s not exactly what happened.
Shortly after making the accusations at a press conference, Oxford, now armed with Cunningham’s side of the story, sent her colleague the following apology:
From:Jeanette Oxford
Sent: Thursday, April 10, 2008 1:39 PM
To: Jane Cunningham
Subject: my apologies
Rep. Cunningham,I owe you an apology. Today I led a press conference calling for passage of the Safe Schools bill (HB 1751) and for you to meet with students who were asked to leave your office. I asked for you to hear their experiences of being bullied at school and to attend the Inclusion Institute for Educators this summer. It should have occurred to me to come to you first and to ask you personally to take those steps. No legislator wants to feel ambushed by her colleagues or the media, and I had not thought this out properly.
It is no excuse, but this is a case where my heart got ahead of my head. As a person who experienced school bullying as a child (bullying based on size, on other appearance characteristics, and on religion), as the best friend of a gay boy who was bullied unmercifully when we were high school students, and as an out lesbian who feels a responsibility to make schools safer now than they were when I was a teen, I simply did not think the process through as well as I should. I wanted to highlight the problem of school bullying - and I can assure you that almost all of the press conference time today WAS indeed focused on information and questions about school bullying, not about you - but still when Bob Watson asked me during the press conference why I didn’t just go to you, it hit me that I should have done that first.
I ask you to recognize that I persuaded Rep. Lampe and Sen. Justus to participate in the press conference today and that my invitation to them focused on the importance of our moving the issue of safe schools forward. If the pace of our week here had allowed it, we quite possibly would have sat and talked through many issues related to the press conference and spotted that an important step had not been taken. Rep. Lampe and Sen. Justus may have even assumed that step HAD been taken; I’m not sure. They left the background work to me and agreed to show up and make a brief statement today. I believe they agreed to attend due to their relationship with me. No malice toward you was intended by any of us. What we want to see is safe schools for all of Missouri’s children. I believe you share that aim as well, but that you have not yet come to recognize some of the realities connected to the dynamics of oppression.
You are welcome to share my apology with the media (thus the written apology) if that is your desire, and I’ll be glad to meet with you and PROMO, the students, the media or anyone else with whom you invite me to meet on this topic.
JMO
Jeanette Mott Oxford
State Representative, 59th District
573-751-4567 (Jefferson City)
314-772-0301 (St. Louis)
Cunningham’s office also released the following statement on the matter:
Because of the heavy legislative role and hectic pace of Jane’s office they have a standard operating procedure that when they have tight deadlines, they try hard to take a few minutes to visit with constituents. Jane’s office always asks if visitors are constituents. The teens misrepresented themselves as living in Jane’s district and would not leave when asked.
Even the teen’s chaperone inserted her foot in Jane’s door when Jane’s assistant repeatedly told her we had to prepare for a committee hearing. The assistant was shaken by the experience.
About This Author: Antonio D. French is a writer, political consultant, and newly-elected Democratic Committeeman living in north St. Louis, Missouri. Have your own opinion about this story? Go ahead and leave a comment. But be respectful to others and show you own a pair by actually using your real name. Anonymity is cowardice. And don't forget to subscribe to our feed and get PubDef stories delivered right to your feed reader or email inbox.
Comments
If Jeanette Mott-Oxford made a mistake in judgement it was not out of any bias grandstanding but instead out of a sincere concern for the children who suffer bullying in our schools.
She apologized for her mistake, will Cunningham have as much dignity to apologize the kids?
Although it isn’t clear from the above post I take it you meant you wanted Jane to apologize to the teens who: lied to her, had to be physically removed from the office, and attempted to ruin her name by playing on Rep Oxford’s emotions? The only people left to apologize are the teens!! They should be treated for what they were… badly dressed teens that lied for attention and unfortunately got it.
I have to ask, what kind of role model is a chaperone who “inserts her foot in Jane’s door?” If the Representative was busy with other duties, isn’t it a little in your face to do something like that? Too bad Legislators have come to expect that kind of behavior from PROMO members.
It’s painfully apparent that Xrep and Straight Dem have something against PROMO and the homosexual community. Why else would either of you leap to defend Cunningham based on her testimony alone instead of the testimony of the teens, their chaperon, and PROMO?
Both of you should be ashamed for attempting to vilify people who are only trying to assert their rights in petitioning the government.
I am not saying Cunningham or PROMO are telling the full truth, or are lying, but jumping to one side or the other based only on your prejudices is reckless, stupid, and disgusting.
I have nothing against the young people personally but have experienced the aggressiveness of PROMO when they’ve visited me (former Rep.). I don’t care what color their hair or how many piercings they have…I do expect them to act respectful. Kindness goes a long ways, on both sides.
I think this just proves that no one has cared to ask jane about what happened. the story was just totally one sided.
“Aggressiveness”? Really? I am curious to know what these troublemakers did to you to give you such a poor impression of them.
You had to of known that there was more to the story! Good for Oxford at least to apologise for her bias grandstanding