last night on late night

John Oliver Talks Public Shaming with an Expert: Monica Lewinsky

The Last Week Tonight host spent Sunday night dissecting how public ridicule works, and how it can destroy lives.

March 18, 2019

As someone who makes his living in comedy and spends a fair amount of time on the Internet, it seems fair to assume that John Oliver knows a thing or two about public shaming. Still, when Oliver tackled the subject on Sunday’s Last Week Tonight, he also brought in an interviewee with even more experience: Vanity Fair contributing editor Monica Lewinsky, whose affair with Bill Clinton permanently attached her name to a historic scandal. Oliver, who looked into how public shaming can function for both good and ill, did not deny that he has made unfair jokes during his career—including about Lewinsky. Thankfully, as Lewinsky told Oliver, she has over the years found ways to laugh about the public humiliation she endured—which at one point seemed never-ending.

During his segment, Oliver examined specific cases of public shaming—including the recent college-admissions scandal, and a case from a few years ago in which a woman was dubbed the “worst aunt ever” for suing her nephew, who injured her wrist during an embrace. (The story, of course, was far more complicated than it initially appeared—but that did not stop the viral story from ruining the aunt’s ability to find jobs.) And so, when Oliver sat down with Lewinsky, his natural starting point was asking whether she believes public shaming can ever be a force for good.

“I do think there’s a spectrum of behavior on which we can sort of judge, as a society, ‘Is this where shaming is effective to change social behavior, or is it damaging?’” Lewinsky replied. Her own experience, she continued, “was a shitstorm. It was an avalanche of pain and humiliation, and, obviously, I could not have gotten through it without my family, and, eventually, when I was allowed to talk to my friends, my friends, too . . . At 24 years old, it was really hard to hold on to a shred of dignity or self-esteem when [I was] just the butt of so many jokes and being misunderstood.”

Lewinsky said that she doesn’t call herself blameless in the scandal, and that she made mistakes as well—prompting Oliver to note that although that may be true, she was also only 22 years old when the affair began. (Clinton was 49.) At that age, people are not known for their excellent decision making skills: “Every 22-year-old is some version of an idiot,” Oliver said—to which Lewinsky replied, “You just lost a lot of viewers.”

“That’s true,” Oliver said. “Not you. Whichever 22-year-old is listening now: not you.”

Either way, Lewinsky said it was surreal to watch her identity get deconstructed and rebuilt before her eyes as the scandal consumed the media—and yes, she said, it did affect her ability to get a job. She didn’t want to hide her identity while applying for positions, because she didn’t want to start her professional relationships on a lie, she said—and besides, “Bill Clinton didn’t have to change his name. Nobody’s ever asked him, ‘Did he think he should change his name?’”

At this point, she said, enough time has passed that Lewinsky can occasionally laugh at some aspects of the scandal. When a friend threw a 90s-themed party, for instance, “For the first time in about 18 years, I donned a black beret.”

Although Oliver and Lewinsky agreed that social media can exacerbate the problem of public shaming by, for instance, granting anonymity to trolls, Lewinsky pointed out that it can also do some good. At the time of the affair, it may have helped Lewinsky to hear from people who related to her story, and disagreed with how it was being handled by the press. “One of the things that happens with these kinds of experiences is that you start to disappear,” she said. “You start to feel like you don’t matter. And I think when somebody sees you, and just acknowledges your humanity in the smallest way, it really can make a world of difference. And you don’t know—it could help save someone’s life.”

Laura Bradley