Erica Jong was on Hardball the other day to explain why men keep engaging in sex scandals and women do not. She babbled something about being in a position of power, which didn’t make much sense, and I must confess that my attempts to figure it out have not made much sense either.
Then I was reading an item in Democratic Underground and a commenter said that, “In order for a woman to get into a powerful position they have to be very smart. If they are smart and savvy enough to get into a powerful position, they are probably smart enough to either avoid these kinds of scandals or hide them better.”
I think that person hit it on the head. Our system is still pretty much male dominated and allows a lot of pretty mediocre men to reach positions of power. So when you take a guy who is really not terribly smart, who does not have much self discipline, and you give him a great deal of power, he is very likely to misuse that power. He won’t do it because he is evil or corrupt, he will do it because he is simply not capable of managing the power which has been given to him.
Women, however, are not going to reach powerful positions unless they are very smart and very disciplined in their thinking and personal habits. Those who are predatory in their personal habits are going to prey on weak men, but we are damn sure never going to know about it.
Update, 9:40am: Of course, Michele Bachmann comes to mind. Hmmm.
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