Political Lust
To be honest, I don’t want to know about a politician’s sexual relationships. I don’t want them to be publicly questioned about it. I don’t want it to be reported by the media. I also don’t want a politician to make a pre-emptive public statement about it. What I do want is for them to effectively perform their duties to their constituents within the government. Their relationships are private matters between themselves and whomever they form relationships with. Specifics:
- If a politician commits a crime (e.g. prostitution) then they should be tried and if found guilty then removed from office. The media doesn’t need to harass their family and the politician doesn’t need to publicly apologize to his/her family. I think it just does more harm to the victims of the crime and the innocent.
- When one politician or political party attacks their opponent based on the private relationships of their opponent, I lose all respect for that politician/party. Forcing a politician to publicly admit or deny something about a personal relationship (e.g. sexual orientation, affairs) is a position they shouldn’t be placed in. Perjury and other career ending stigmas occur because of questions that never should be asked.
- Sometimes a politician takes a proactive stance and makes an unsolicited statement about a private relationship that they feel could be used against them by their opponents. Again, this is not something I want to know about them and I don’t approve of them.
One of the themes that I think occurs in a lot of the circumstances above is that there is usually a victim who is not the politician. It is often the spouse of the politician. I am not saying that the activities of the politician are something I commend. The spouse may already have been hurt by the politician’s activities, but now they get to be publicly humiliated and taken advantage of by the media too.
The public often also suffers. These petty, media hyped distractions take away from the real business of running an effective government for the people. Politics has enough drama already, let’s leave relationship drama to the TV soap operas.
