The new Miss USA took a powerful stand for women in the military

By Fusion Staff  |  June 6, 2016 | 1:05pm
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Miss District of Columbia—also known as Deshauna Barber—captured the crown at the Miss USA pageant on Sunday. If you watched Miss D.C. answer the hell out of her interview question, then her win probably came as no surprise.

While the very thought of pageant interviews may take you right back to poor Miss South Carolina Teen USA’s word salad panic in 2007 (if you’re reading this, Miss South Carolina Teen USA, I would like to give you a hug), Barber gave us what must be one of the most inspiring moments in Miss USA history last night: a genuinely empowering, feminist statement on the role of women in the military.

Judge Joe Zee raised a question that he described as “a little bit personal and close to your heart.” He asked, “The Pentagon recently made the decision to open up all combat jobs to women. Now some have questioned if this has put political correctness over our military’s ability to perform at the highest level. What are your thoughts?”

Deshauna Barber, you see, is an Army officer. The 26-year-old serves as the Logistics Commander for the 988th Quartermaster Detachment Unit at Fort Meade, Md., in addition to working as an IT analyst with the Department of Commerce.

“As a woman in the United States Army,” Barber began, as the crowd proceeded to lose their goddamn minds.

“I think it is an amazing job by our government to allow women to integrate into every branch of the military,” she said. “We are just as tough as men. As a commander of my unit, I am powerful, I am dedicated, and it is important that we recognize that gender does not limit us in the United States Army.”

Mic, consider yourself dropped.

Molly Fitzpatrick is senior editor of Fusion’s Pop & Culture section. Her interests include movies about movies, TV shows about TV shows, and movies about TV shows, but not so much TV shows about movies.

 
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