Richard Cohen has this piece in the Washington Post today on Monica Lewinsky and the way the press has done her wrong, including the columnI discussed at this post on Monica's master's thesis and the idea of dumb-but-smart people (smart people who do dumb things).
An approximation of this befalls us all, but before we got to become wise and prudent in all things we were probably irresponsible, outrageous and wild -- in other words, young.
Fortunately for me -- and probably this applies to you as well -- my outrageous deeds are known to only a few, and some of those people, after a lifetime of bad marriages and poor investments, have probably forgotten them. In Lewinsky's case, her youthful indiscretion has been forgotten by no one. On the contrary, it's recorded for the ages, in House and Senate proceedings, in the files of the creepy special prosecutor, in the databases of newspapers, in presidential histories and the musty joke files of second-rate comics.
She is a branded woman, not an adulterer but something even worse -- a girl toy, a trivial thing, a punch line. Yet she did what so many women at that age would do. She seduced (or so she thought) an older man. She fantasized that he would leave his wife for her. Here was her crime: She was a girl besotted.
Monica is the ultimate Girl with a Reputation, the one your mother warned you about. You would think, in this day and age, that such things wouldn't matter but they still do. Unfortunately for Lewinsky, no matter what else she manages to do with her life, her obit will always be about Bill Clinton and impeachment. That's her punishment, which is the appropriate word in her case, as opposed to the way moonbats use it in reference to pregnancy.
The weird part about Cohen's piece is his, at time, paternalistic attitude towards Lewinsky while decrying the sexism of the press. There's this:
Her clock ticks, her life ebbs. Where is the man for her? Where is the guy brave enough, strong enough, admirable enough to take her as his wife, to suffer the slings and arrows of her outrageous fortune -- to say to the world (for it would be the entire world) that he loves this woman who will always be an asterisk in American history. I hope there is such a guy out there. It would be nice. It would be fair.
followed by this:
It would be nice, too, and fair, also, if Lewinsky were treated by the media as it would treat a man. What's astounding is the level of sexism applied to her, as if the wave of the women's movement broke over a new generation of journalists and not a drop fell on any of them. Where, pray tell, is the man who is remembered just for sex? Where is the guy who is the constant joke for something he did in his sexually wanton youth? Maybe here and there some preacher, but in those cases the real subject matter is not sex but hypocrisy. Other than those, no names come to mind.
This is the year 2007, brand new and full of promise. It would be nice if my colleagues in the media would resolve to treat Monica Lewinsky as a lady(.)
As Ann Althouse notes,
Cohen's dreamy wish for a man to love Lewinsky isn't the least sexist thing I've ever read. I'm guessing Monica has all the boyfriends she wants. I'll bet they have lots of laughs sharing intimate gossip about the old man who transgressed to be with her. Why assume she wants to marry or marriage is some special solace that she needs? Why say her life is ebbing?
It is sexist and implies that Lewinsky is incomplete without a man to tell the world how much he loves this tainted woman. Why assume that is what she wants or what would wash away the stain of that little blue dress?
My suspicion is that Lewinsky has always tried to make the best of her circumstances, all things considered. She doesn't seem to be hiding in a tower waiting for Prince Charming to come rescue her.
Cohen's piece reminds me of all those people who don't "get it." They think that saying the press should "treat her like a lady" is what grown-up women want. What's missing in Cohen's piece is the idea of respect. What Lewinsky wants is respect.
Unfortunately, the indiscretions of her youth outweigh other factors in her favor because of the unusual quality of her circumstances, as well as residual sexism, even among so-called enlightened opinion writers.
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