Juanita Broaddrick, the woman who claims Bill Clinton raped her in a hotel room in 1978, is speaking out again.
Broaddrick’s claim was never proven, and Clinton was never charged. But the resurfacing of her allegations has complicated matters for Hillary Clinton and her feminist supporters.
For example, after Hillary tweeted in September 2015 that sexual assault survivors had “the right to be believed,” she was asked at a campaign event whether that statement ought to apply to Broaddrick as well.
“Well, I would say that everybody should be believed at first until they are disbelieved based on evidence,” Clinton answered awkwardly.
Earlier this year, Hillary’s campaign website removed some text on its page dedicated to “Campus sexual assault” with respect to a victim’s “right to be believed.”
The feminist website Wonkette has weighed in on Broaddrick’s claims, recently reiterated in a wide-ranging interview with BuzzFeed. Their take is a rather interesting one. In short: Sure, Bill Clinton is probably a rapist, but that doesn’t mean he’s not a good guy, for the following reasons:
Everyone was doing it.
I can absolutely see Bill Clinton doing this (then, not now) and not even thinking of it as rape, but thinking of it as dominant, alpha sex. I can see a LOT of men doing that during that time period…
He said he was sorry.
I think Bill Clinton could very well have raped Juanita Broaddrick; that it doesn’t make him an evil man, or irredeemable (I’m Catholic; we’re all forgiven, if we’re sorry, and Broaddrick says Bill Clinton personally called her up to apologize).
It was only that one time.
I think good men can rape, and be sorry, and not do it again. This is very bad feminism.
On the other hand, this Wonkette writer continues, this doesn’t necessary make Bill Clinton a “bad feminist,” provided he felt bad about it and stopped raping. And it doesn’t hurt that he’s a Democrat nominally married to the person who will probably become the first female president in history.
This is a very interesting take, indeed, reflecting these times.
