How do you look like?
Me too. You too. Us too.
Wide margin of appreciation.
“I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky. I never told anybody to lie, not a single time; never. These allegations are false. And I need to go back to work for the American people”, said President Bill Clinton on the 26th January 1998. It took him nearly a week to say something after the scandal broke out, but obviously, he denied having a sexual affair with the White House Intern. He only admitted the fact of having “improper physical relationship” some seven months later, after a DNA-test.
Clinton’s behavior was classic. He denied the fact and referred to his other and obviously more important duties, relativizing the importance of the allegations. The President of the United States just doesn’t have time for silly stories like this. But he indeed had time for enjoying some oral sex at the Oval Office. And obviously, the Lewinsky affair was just the tip of the iceberg. In his closer circles, Clinton has been always known for his immense sexual appetite. But people just shrugged their shoulder with a bittersweet smile. That’s the way he is. But he is a great politician, anyway. As the European Parliament is full of great politicians and staffers as well. By the way.
The Monica Lewinsky affair has become an iconic case of political history and an evergreen inspiration for memes. I am super sorry to admit but I even find some of them funny. Maybe I have spent too much time in Brussels and become endlessly cynical about the abuse of power. Ah yeah, that’s the way it is.
But I remember very well the first time I faced sexism in Brussels. I couldn’t tell how happy I was with myself after a certain achievement. I believed I was convincing and professional. Then I learnt a couple of weeks later that my success must have rather been attributed to the fact that the person in decision-making position had a taste for Eastern European women.
I tried to play it off and made fun about the story how I discovered the selection criteria. We also made our internal joke with my colleagues referring to this case. “How do you look like?!”, they ask when I leave for a meeting in jeans or flat heel shoes.
Compared to the recently admitted cases from the Eurobubble, I can’t even complain. He never asked anything in return. But still, my self-esteem has been seriously challenged. Maybe I am not that good professionally as I think I am. And it still hurts.
I don’t even want to be a hypocrite. It’s just wonderful when there’s a flirtatious tension between two people, and someone makes us a favor just because they like us. But that’s a mutual interest, heading from professional life to the private sphere. It has nothing to with one-sided actions taking advantage of hierarchy and power relations of your job. It has nothing to do with your biggest fear of not being good enough professionally without some services.
So, chapeau for all those people who took the courage, fought the core shame and talked about their harassment cases at their workplaces. Maybe we won’t get back to business as usual with a bittersweet smile, as it happened with Monica and Bill. Maybe something will slowly change. So that we could all be finally good enough.