Lord Acton, a 19th century Englishman, once said: "Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely" (acton.org). Most people are familiar with this quote, but I most people don't know the rest of the quote, which goes: "Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence and not authority; still more when you superadd the tendency of the certainty of the corruption by authority" (acton.org). Everyone knows the infamous story of Bill Clinton and his affair with his secretary, Monica Lewinsky. However, this is not an isolated case in American politics, or American society in general. It seems that men, when given positions of power, seem to transform into a modern werewolf: A sexual deviant, hungry for the flesh of women subordinate to him. But not only that, the women involved in these cases are often portrayed as villainous succubi, or even modern - day witches.
The Clinton/Lewinsky story is well known, but even more recent affairs between men of power and the women they were involved with would be: Arnold Schwarzenegger and his affair with his maid; the appropriately named Anthony Weiner and his penis - tweeting scandal; and General David Pertraeus. In each case, the men attempted to act out or succeeded in acting out their sexual tendencies on women who worked for them. In Otten's "Trial Records, Historical Accounts, Sightings" piece, almost all examples of werewolves are men who delight in the rape and consumption of women, often much younger than they are. While these men did not eat said women, they did take advantage of them sexually. In each case the men described themselves as making mistakes and acting outside their nature, which could be construed as they were doing these things as if were a separate version of themselves. As if they had transformed into a form of werewolf.
What is more interesting to me, however, is how the media portrayed the women in each of these cases. Monica Lewinsky and Paula Broadwell (the woman involved with General Pertraeus) were immediately vilified by the media and resigned from their posts. With the Schwarzenegger case, more and more women came forward to say that they were also sexually assaulted by him. As they came forward, the media suggested that they were simply taking advantage of Schwarzenegger's affair in an attempt to cash in on his misfortune. In Palmer's "Witches", the "witches" were peasant women who were given the title by women of higher standing. However in modern times, the situation seems to be somewhat reversed, where the witches are now women of higher socioeconomic standing.
With the exception of Anthony Weiner, all the men in the aforementioned cases have continued on with careers: Schwarzenegger is still a well - loved movie star, Clinton is still regarded as a great President and continues with political work, and Pertraeus is an established businessman and has been granted the title of Honorary Professor at multiple universities. Opposite them, the women whom they were involved with have been sentenced to public disgrace and resignation from their respective positions. Henri Boguet, the judge from "Trial Records" said that the werewolf in his case had been deluded by Satan and thus could not be charged with a crime because he was insane. Thus, the criminal committed his crimes as a "werewolf", but as a human was innocent. The same can be seen with these men, who committed their crimes as a kind of modern "sexual werewolf", but as regular people were acquitted. The women, however, seem to have been found as guilty as the sexual crimes in Palmer's writings. In the way that the witches of the past were burned at the stake, these modern "witches" have been burned in the eyes of the public.
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