home
Sunday, 28 July 2013
Isn't it time to call the spectacle of the suffering political wife, standing by her man in the media glare as he admits to his latest sexual offense against her, what it really is: spousal abuse?
Huma Abedin
has the right to make any decisions she wants about her life, just as a
victim of domestic abuse has the right to return for more -- but we
don't have to stand silently by and condone it.
On Tuesday, she read from
a script about forgiving her husband, New York mayoral candidate
Anthony Weiner, as he was forced to address allegations that he sent
sexually explicit texts and photographs of his genitals to a woman he'd
never met, a year after he'd resigned in shame for this very accusations
in 2011 and publicly promised to stop. And after she'd given birth to
their child, and after he'd presumably gone to whatever Twitter sexting
rehab he found, and Lord knows what else.
We have the right to say
that we will not enable this anymore; we will not endorse it; we will
not bless it just because it is her "choice." Instead, we will call a
public figure's cheating on his wife, then bringing her to the mea culpa
press conference, not only offensive to her but a slap in the face to
women in the electorate.
Who is Huma Abedin?
It was bad enough when
Harvard Law grad Silda Wall Spitzer stood mutely beside then-New York
Gov. Eliot Spitzer as he confessed in 2008 to patronizing prostitutes.
Or when former hospital executive Dina McGreevey stood silently next to
her cheating husband, then-New Jersey Gov. Jim McGreevey, as he
announced his resignation in 2004.
Some of us are trying to
raise our girls to be more than voiceless partners sucking up their
pride as their husbands trample over their dignity. Men like Weiner and
Spitzer were well aware of the excruciating pain the disclosure of their
thrill-seeking behavior would cause their wives while they were public
figures, and they engaged in it anyway, via elaborate lies and
artifices, eyes wide open. In the case of Anthony Weiner, a.k.a. Carlos
Danger -- and maybe all of them -- that risk probably amped up the
sexual excitement.
Why we act on stupid impulses
Here's the simple rule
for male politicians: If you had your fun without her, man up and face
the press corps without her. Ironically, each of these men calls himself
a feminist. Respect for women begins at home, fellas.
Home
