Extreme Reactions Violate Moral Boundaries
Monica Lewinsky says something worth considering about public behavior
There were and surprisingly still are people who are highly critical of Monica Lewinsky for her judgment and actions with Bill Clinton when he was President. Fair enough. Yet it can be be argued that the punishment she endured was far beyond what was reasonable and that it led to more than expected consequences, it resulted in trauma, deep emotional wounding and painful psychological scarring.
"I went to bed one night a private person, and the next day I was known by the entire world," Lewinsky told journalist Taylor Lorenz in an article published in The Guardian.
If people don’t want to empathize with that statement and plight, that is perfectly understood. It was her choice to do what she did with the President Clinton, a married man. Let’s go a little deeper though.
Tessa Petak at InStyle briefly wrote about a Taylor Lorenz interview in her piece, titled Monica Lewinsky Opened Up About Being the First Person to Lose Her Reputation Online.
“When Lorenz questioned how Lewinsky survived the trolls and the media frenzy, Lewinsky said that sometimes, she can't even believe that she is still alive,” Petak writes. "I have a friend who, every time I see her, at some point in our hangout, she’ll just sort of shake her head and go: 'I can’t believe you’re still here,'“ Lewinsky says. “I feel very grateful for whatever combination of positive and negative traits I have that allowed me to survive."
That’s serious and heavy. Should social mobbing have put Lewinsky in such a dark, scary, overwhelming place?
If we give Lewinsky the benefit of the doubt that she is being honest in her statement that a friend and her can’t even believe she is alive, it’s an important social question to ponder: Should Lewinsky’s actions have led to such an abusive reaction and figurative stalking and battery by the media and the public to where a person, a young adult, considered suicide or worse, committed it and was otherwise in a deep depressive, traumatized state?
A question worth asking at least, I suggest.
Lewinsky showed poor judgment and selfishness because of the impact her behavior had on Bill Clinton’s wife and daughter, yet did she commit an unforgivable felony and crime against humanity?
Maybe you say, “yes” or maybe you say, “of course not.” Whichever your answer, only the worst of the worst reputations and people should be considered irredeemable.
Looking at this story from a different angle, a lesson here to be learned about how what may seem like relatively harmless behavior in our mind can explode like a bomb in our lives and affect us profoundly for years, decades or the rest of our lives.
Conducting forward think before we err is really difficult at times. If we can bring ourselves to do so however, we will protect our future self. If we give in, our future self and people around us will be forced to suffer unimaginable, variable pains.
Michael Toebe is a reputation consultant, advisor and communications specialist at Reputation Quality, assisting individuals and organizations with further building reputation as an asset or ethically protecting, restoring or reconstructing it.
Subscribe for free or become a paid subscriber to receive and access “extras,” whichever works best for you.
Want your services or products to be seen in Reputation Intelligence or discuss a partnership? Let’s talk about it to see how you can benefit.
Contact me (Michael) at Rep.Intel.News@gmail.com and you and I can talk about your objectives and value offering and create an impressive visual ad and message to prominently, impressively display in the newsletter for a month at a time, or longer.
$475 for an ad for two issues of the newsletter. Links to your About page, landing page or home page are $250 (one issue of the newsletter) per link.
Note
Reputation Quality Analyst Services:
Paid Professional Opinion — Consulting — Ongoing Advisory and Communications