Monica Lewinsky being sworn in during her videotaped deposition in the impeachment trial of President Bill Clinton in 1999.
I grew up with Monica Lewinsky. No, I wasn’t one of the kids at her Brentwood or Beverly Hills schools who called her names, but from the age of six, I knew who she was, what she did in the White House and had some pretty problematic opinions about it. In America, and across the world, she was a joke that everyone was in on. Late-night talk show hosts and comedians covered it all, from the beret, the cigar and of course, the dress — and we all laughed. But it didn’t stop there, her weight was a major punch line and her name became a euphemism for certain sexual acts. Here are some gems from David Letterman via Bustle from that time:
“Celebrity birthdays, today Monica Lewinsky is 28. It seemed like just yesterday she was crawling around on the floor in the Oval Office.”
“Monica Lewinsky has her own show on HBO. I have not seen it yet but I understand it’s getting very good word of mouth.”
“Monica Lewinsky was on Larry King Live tonight. Monica really liked Larry King. Actually, she likes any guy with a desk.”
“President Bush has authorised the drop of 15,000-pound bombs on Afghanistan. I believe that is the heaviest ordered drop by a president since … well, Monica.”
These jokes continued for a good decade after the scandal. While they did get old at some point, I can’t say that I genuinely disapproved of them at the time. If someone were to call them out for being cruel, you’d probably have been asked if you meant that they were a “low blow,” or “hitting below the belt.”
Monica Lewinsky and Bill Clinton embrace 1996.
My parents were on the stricter-side, so I didn’t watch the Barbara Walters interview with Lewinsky in 1999 to get a play-by-play of the affair, senate hearing and aftermath – I saw it in 2014 – at roughly the same age Lewinsky was when she started her White House internship. The whole story is very salacious, and still fascinates us with its tales of power, sex and politics. Some of the details, like how the affair started after Lewinsky pulled her thong up above her trousers to signal interest to the President, seem very of the time as g-strings were the height of sex appeal (see Sisquo’s 1999 “Thong Song”). But, if I’m being honest, I could see a couple of my university friends getting into similar situations, given the right opportunity — not because it was necessarily the right thing to do, but when you are a woman of that age, you are highly sexualised and not taken super seriously by society.
Bill Clinton definitely didn’t get off with a clean reputation, but as Lewinsky has pointed out several times, it’s not called the “Bill Clinton” scandal. The former President had an illustrious career before the controversy and managed to work professionally after being proven a liar in his “I did not have sexual relations with that woman” speech, even standing by his wife’s side as she made a serious bid for the presidency in 2016. “That woman” on the other hand, found the job search difficult after her internship. In her HBO special, she talks at length about how when she had her name on her CV, people would only interview her to see what she was really like in person – with no intention of offering her a job – and that putting down a fake name didn’t help because it would be the same situation when she walked into the room. She has been open about depression and suicidal attempts she had in the years following the scandal.
Fast forward through the #MeToo movement to 2019, and the whole situation looks a lot different. Although misogyny has not been eradicated, there is a general consensus in the media, and in the courts, that the boss – and not the intern – carries the burden of responsibility in the case of a workplace affair. Even if we want to debate whether or not sleeping with your superior is a good move or not, shaming people for their weight, or for what body types they are attracted to is not acceptable. While Lewinsky’s confidant Linda Tripp may have been the Judas that asked Lewinsky to confide in her, taped the conversations for a possible book deal and then handed over the recordings to the special prosecutor in exchange for immunity, the phrase “cruel as school children” seems apt for the way the world bullied “that woman.” I was in elementary school at the time, but it seems that there were no adults in the room.
More than 20 years later, Lewinsky hasn’t been able to leave her namesake scandal behind, but she has been able to find some agency by using her experience of having her name, likeness and identity dragged through the mud to become a fierce anti-bullying advocate and now, the producer of American Crime Story’s 2020 retelling of the story. After two decades, she can even make a blowjob joke . I’m not proud of the jokes I laughed at when I was younger, but seeing how time has reframed the event gives me hope that we are actually growing up.