Our World Could Use a Nice Dose of Julia Sugarbaker Right Now

This Atlantan interior decorator was an unapologetic ball-buster, and Dixie Carter was a class act

Exactly two years ago today, Ruth Bader Ginsburg passed away. Millions of Americans mourned not only her death — but the onslaught of judicial tyranny from conservative activist judges that we saw coming our way, as the U.S. Supreme Court’s balance became lopsided by replacing a staunch liberal justice with a reactionary conservative justice.

If you’re a fan of the 1986–93 CBS sitcom Designing Women, you remember Dixie Carter’s firebrand character of Julia Sugarbaker. As the owner of the Sugarbaker & Associates interior design firm, Julia had a trademark style where she would tell off other people due to their corruption, idiocy, deceit, or arrogance.

It didn’t matter whether they were a business client, a friend-of-a-friend, or a random person on the street. The eloquence of Julia’s words resembled a blade of steel — slicing apart inane worldviews with precision and then eviscerating them by using a combination of self-righteous anger and intellectual grace.

Check out some of Julia Sugarbaker’s most classic rants, HERE:

As a centrist, I didn’t agree with every single one of Julia’s individual beliefs…but I felt solidarity with a majority of the values she espoused.

The irony is that the late Dixie Carter herself was a political libertarian. In contrast to Julia’s progressivism and liberalism, Carter embraced the ideology of classic conservatism found in moderate Republicans of yesteryear.

However, Carter also had a strong affection for Designing Women creator/showrunner Linda Bloodworth-Thomason. So they struck a deal. Because Carter loved to sing: for every elongated rant that Julia went on, within any of the episodic scripts — Julia would be guaranteed a vocal number to be performed in a subsequent episode.

Which explains why we got the pleasure of hearing Carter’s beautiful singing voice in so many episodes.

I’ve written about how the brutality of our world is getting the better of us. It’s fueling a bleak narrative in our zeitgeist, making it hard for even the most optimistic people not to lose hope.

If Designing Women was on the air today (and Carter was still alive to portray Julia), it brings me satisfaction and empowerment to imagine how she might take down some of the most odious public figures to whom Americans have been subjected in recent years.

So I’m going to take this moment to channel my “inner Julia Sugarbaker.”

Using Julia’s voice and style — and then, merging them with my own beliefs — I’m going to script out how she might have verbally dismantled ten specific abhorrent socio-political personalities during this past decade.

Julia’s Monologue to Ted Cruz

“I never thought I’d see the day where a United States Senator is taken seriously by the so-called ‘mainstream media’ after engaging in hijinks unbecoming of an elected official. Between scaring Americans with communist phantoms, ignoring the science behind melted ice caps, and denying relief to hurricane victims, your desired legacy appears to be the prevention of any economic prosperity whatsoever unless you can receive personal credit for it while denying that same credit to anyone whom you happen to despise.

So, Senator — if-that’s-your-real-occupation — Cruz…you can take your copy of Green Eggs & Ham, and, in the immortal words of Weird Al Yankovic: just eat it.”

Julia’s Monologue to Amy Coney Barrett

“Now don’t go running to your sugar daddy, Bitch McConnell — and this is one of the few times in my life I’ll actually use the word ‘bitch’ in a derogatory manner — but your black-robed status as a mother to adopted children does not exempt you from receiving a much-needed wake-up call. On behalf of the American people to whom you have lied and whom you regularly gaslight, Justice Barrett, let’s review some grim truths.

Giving women access to life-saving surgeries is not ‘barbaric.’ Batting around racial slurs is never acceptable, regardless of how ‘poor’ an employee’s performance may have been. And defrauding consumers is not the God-given right of creditors. So I highly suggest, Justice — and I use that term loosely — Barrett, that you get up off of your ‘high bench’ before Aunt Lydia, of all people, is forced to take you over her knee to spare you the indignity of becoming the judicial world’s modern-day Marie Antoinette.”

Julia’s Monologue to Bill Maher

“I’m just going to cut right to the chase, Bill Maher, since it would be a waste of my time to sugarcoat it: you are a reality-warping, inconsistent, heartless, attention-seeking, illogical, pompous ass. We get it. You hate young people. You hate empowered women. You hate dignified soldiers. You hate upstanding souls who merely express their positive religious beliefs with civility and class.

You hate plebeians beneath you who wish to protect ourselves from coronavirus. And this culminates in your gratuitous taunting of human beings who don’t share the same privilege as those of us who have had the luxury of being born in a body that suits our needs. But I’m sure you’ll be pleased to hear that I’m NOT going to attempt to ‘cancel’ you. And the reason for that, Bill, is that you are simply not worth canceling.”

Julia’s Monologue to Amber Heard

“Since you fancy yourself a ‘role model’ for women and girls, Ms. Heard, might I take a moment to remind you of some sobering truths? Depositing feces atop one’s bed, bragging about intent to weaponize gender so you can spout lies that the general public would be prone to believe, and lacerating your husband’s finger — those transgressions do not a role model make.

Ms. Heard, you can take your serpentine smirking, your arrogant chuckles, and your crocodile tears, and promptly crawl back into the disgusting swamp that bred you.”

Julia’s Monologue to Harvey Weinstein

“Mr. Weinstein, you are the reason women cannot feel safe on this ill-begotten earth. If your body was truly a temple, let me assure you…nuns and priestesses and demigoddesses would be desperately fleeing from every crevice of your girth. It doesn’t matter how many Democrats you’ve supported with your bank account. We don’t care how many citizens’ guns you try to ban. You can finance all of the house-building and soup kitchens you please.

None of that will inoculate you from being remembered, throughout the rest of eternity, across time and space, as a sordid excuse for a subhuman whose allegedly-decaying teeth presumably haven’t stopped you from nibbling the flesh of women whom you prey upon with all of the charm of Emperor Commodus and half the sanity of Hannibal Lecter.”

Julia’s Monologue to Dave Chappelle

“Let me tell you this, Mr. Chappelle. You used to be funny. There was once a time when I would laugh along with you, in solidarity, as you mastered social commentary on the ills of white privilege and systemic poverty. But those days, my dear, have long passed.

You see, Mr. Chappelle, there are more than just Black and White people residing within our country. And many LGBT+ folks are also People of Color. But you tend to conveniently forget this as you proceed to bask in race-baiting, transphobia, and whiny iconism where you have turned yourself into the primary martyr amongst your own delusions of grandeur.

Like so many ‘men of a certain age,’ Mr. Chappelle, you would be doing our society a favor if you gallantly rode off into the sunset. Unfortunately, as is often the case for your ilk amongst the Hollywood elite, I fear that your fragile ego will prevent you from achieving this rather mediocre task.”

Julia’s Monologue to Andrew Cuomo

“You may have guided your constituents through a pandemic, former Governor-For-Life Cuomo; but that doesn’t absolve you of bathing in the stench of corruption that you wear with all the ease of Kopari Sun Shield. Thousands of deceased nursing home residents are turning over in their graves, because of you.

The women who’ve worked for you have exposed your ubiquity of sexual inquisitions and seemingly-innocuous pats on their hineys. Such feigned innocence didn’t work for Al Franken, and it won’t work for you. Mr. Cuomo, the backslapping and cult-like echo chambers shared by you and Brother Christopher are emblematic of why the American people do not trust politicians today.”

Julia’s Monologue to Wendy Williams

“Ms. Williams, if the radio world somehow employed prostitutes and tax evaders, you would be their Heidi Fleiss. Since we all cannot be as cool as you, allow me to put the ‘deep freeze’ on several of your preconceptions. Public breastfeeding isn’t shameful; it’s natural. Gametes are not open-source commodities to be shoved away into your purse as though they were complimentary breath mints at Morton’s Steakhouse. If someone is disabled, or the target of sexual assault, or falls outside of heteronormative etchings, that doesn’t give you carte blanche to demean them on your annoying little talk show.

And not every hunky male celebrity should have his hypothetical virginity, or lack thereof, scrutinized by your stamp of approval. As a survivor, you of all people should be more aware of these things. Perhaps we need Geppetto to stop by your studio so he can craft you a nose guard and a muzzle. You can even bedazzle it with sequins.”

Julia’s Monologue to Meghan McCain

“As someone who takes every waking opportunity to remind the rest of the planet how you happen to be the offspring of a heroic military veteran, you appear content to sabotage any public displays that would suggest you are capable of following in his conceptual footsteps. Your entire ‘maverick’ brand, Ms. McCain, is a demonstration of snarls and exaggerations whenever anyone talks over you, even as you proceed to do the exact same thing to others.

Your victimhood turns a blind eye to how the public hates you — NOT because you happen to be a Republican, but, rather, because you misconstrue everything your rivals utter while misrepresenting anything they stand for. So, while you clearly love being perched under your tiara embodying narcissism and tone-deaf nonsequiturs, as the Princess of Arizona, it’s high time you be dethroned.”

Julia’s Monologue to Steve Bannon

“I’m not going to expend my vocal cords railing against the atrocity that is your puppet, Donald Trump. I already did that, 31 years ago. Magnificently, I might add. But you are a criminal, Mr. Bannon, plain and simple. And your tangerine chia pet is no longer around to pardon you. I don’t have a plethora of spare hours at my disposal, so I will take just a quick moment to list off the most egregious cases of depravity in your portfolio. Wiring dirty money. Stealing the funds that citizens donated for your beloved border wall. Threatening to decapitate Dr. Fauci. Giving comfort to insurrectionists.

Oh, and handpicking a presidential cabinet of downright unqualified termites who rival even the motley crew cobbled together by Ulysses S. Grant. I’d sign off by wishing that you be saddled down with a lifetime prison sentence, Mr. Bannon; but, quite frankly, even *that* would be too good for you.”

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