>>Monica Lewinsky’s case illustrates the rest of the equation: ‘’Yes means yes’’
Steinim is a lying bitch. The Feminist movement protested against bosses hiring sex secretaries who willingly went for overnight out of town trips with the boss or freely consented to office romps.
It was said that it put these women at unfair advantage for promotion and consideration (Louis Jordan got Monica a Revlon gig for lying under oath). Also they said that such workplace sexual affairs created a hostile work environment.
Gloria Steinem on her Bill Clinton essay: 'I wouldnt write the same thing now'
The feminist icon spoke to the Guardian about her 1998 op-ed, which drew criticism: what you write in one decade you dont necessarily write in the next
Gloria Steinem would not mount the same vigorous defence of Bill Clinton today that she offered in a controversial 1998 article that downplayed accusations of harassment against the then president, the feminist icon has told the Guardian. But Steinem said she did not regret writing the New York Times article in the first place.
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We have to believe women. I wouldnt write the same thing now because theres probably more known about other women now. Im not sure, she said on the red carpet of an annual comedy benefit for the Ms Foundation for Women, of which she is a founder. What you write in one decade you dont necessarily write in the next. But Im glad I wrote it in that decade. It was her first extended comment on the op-ed since it became fodder for a revitalized debate about the string of sexual misconduct claims against Clinton, and the political forces that helped him survive them. If all the sexual allegations now swirling around the White House turn out to be true, President Clinton may be a candidate for sex addiction therapy, read Steinems 1998 essay, titled Feminists and the Clinton Question. But, even if the allegations are true, the President is not guilty of sexual harassment. He is accused of having made a gross, dumb and reckless pass, she continued. President Clinton took no for an answer.
Her words have come under scrutiny amid a national reckoning over sexual harassment and renewed questions about whether the multiple accusations should have doomed Clintons presidency. At the time of her letter, former Arkansas state employee Paula Jones was suing Clinton for sexual harassment, and Kathleen Willey had just given an interview to 60 Minutes about Clinton making an unwanted sexual advance. Clinton, Willey claimed, kissed her on the mouth during a private meeting to discuss job opportunities. She pushed back away from him, she claimed, and he touched her breasts and placed her hand on his erect penis. The gravest allegation came one year later, when former campaign volunteer Juanita Broaddrick accused Clinton of rape. Clinton has always denied non-consensual sexual contact. But if those regrets exist, they are not Steinems. Im glad I wrote it at the time, she said. Because the danger then was we were about to lose sexual harassment law because it was being applied to extramarital sex, free will, extramarital sex, as with Monica Lewinsky. Clinton had an affair with Lewinsky but both agree it was consensual.
Steinem appears to have been referring to the bruising legal battle that began when Jones, a former Arkansas state clerk, sued Clinton, then the sitting president, for sexual harassment. Jones claimed Clinton in his role as Arkansass governor summoned her to his hotel room, where he touched her, tried to kiss her, dropped his pants and asked for oral sex. A judge later dismissed Joness case, saying Clintons alleged behavior, while boorish and offensive, did not meet the legal definition of sexual harassment.
In her op-ed, Steinem was even more generous toward Clinton. Clinton seems to have made a clumsy sexual pass, then accepted rejection, Steinem wrote, adding there appears to be little evidence of Jones suffering psychological damage. Steinems thinking on Jones and her accusations seems unchanged today. Asked if Joness accusation amounted to something other than a free will encounter, Steinem replied, Paula Jones, in spite of all the pressures on her, said very clearly, He said to me, I wouldnt want you to do anything you dont want to do. That was part of her testimony.
The problem at the time was, the sexual harassment law was in danger, she said. If Clinton had resigned, that would have endangered the law.