The Kennedy women covered up their husbands' excesses (The Guardian)

[Apollo11]

The Guardian (London, UK) - August 27, 2009

Silvio Berlusconi may well have led a life of much greater probity than any of the Kennedy brothers; yet Italy's prime minister is already an object of universal derision while the Kennedys, even after their deaths, still rank high in the pantheon of American gods.

It doesn't help Berlusconi that he looks and behaves like a villain in a comic opera, and that he cannot aspire to the gravitas of which the Kennedys were capable. But one shouldn't overlook the role of wives in fashioning their husbands' reputations. It was Berlusconi's wife, Veronica Lario, who understandably started the flood of allegations that he was obsessed with young women. The wives of Jack, Robert and Edward Kennedy, on the other hand, were united in protecting them from the public exposure of their weaknesses.

Most important by far was the president's wife, Jackie Kennedy, who was a ferocious custodian of the Kennedy image, even though her husband was a serial adulterer. She not only tolerated his infidelities, but did her very best to conceal them from the world. She was even the principal creator of the Camelot myth that she devoted so much of her life to promoting. The other Kennedy wives – Robert's wife, Ethel, and Edward's two wives, Joan and Vicki - were also intensely loyal to their wayward spouses.

Ethel, a devout Catholic, never wavered in her support for the philandering Robert, by whom she had 11 children. Joan, by her own admission, took to the bottle so as not to "get mad or ask questions concerning the rumours about Ted and his girlfriends", and she stood steadfastly by him during the 1969 Chappaquiddick scandal, in which he took eight hours to contact the police after Mary Jo Kopechne, a young woman he was driving home from a party, drowned when his car went off a bridge on Martha's Vineyard. Joan even went with him to Kopechne's funeral. In 1980, when he ran for president, he had already been separated from Joan for two years. But she nevertheless campaigned for him and promised that, if he were elected, she would live with him in the White House. They were finally divorced in 1982.

Edward's second wife, Vicki, married him 10 years later, just after he had been involved in another damaging scandal – the trial of his nephew, William Kennedy Smith, for the alleged rape in Ted's house of a girl they had met while out drinking in a bar. Vicki was so determined to protect him from any further bad publicity that she even made sure that this notorious drinker was never photographed with a glass in his hand.

It was a great achievement of Edward Kennedy to have risen so high above Chappaquiddick and a rackety private life that President Obama felt able to describe him this week as "a great leader" and "the greatest United States senator of our time". But I doubt if that would have been possible if he had been married to Veronica Lario.

Alexander Chancellor

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/aug/27/alexander-chancellor-kennedys-reputations

[Apollo11]

1. I see the recs and unrecs are very evenly balanced on this one!

:popcorn:

[JeanGrey]

2. I'm glad someone finally wrote this. All day yesterday when

everyone was talking about Ted and Mary Jo, all I can think of was Joan, Jackie and others and how they suffered.

[cdsilv]

4. Yes - the Kennedy's are human. and this is a surprise?

However, they do seem to use their wealth to try to help others. It would have been easy for them to be 'trustafarians' and just devote their lives to idle leisure as so many of the children of wealth do.

But they didn't. Some of them devoted their lives (and gave their lives) to public service.

Therefore, we honor them flawed though they may be.

[JeanGrey]

8. When I look at the suffering that being a Kennedy wife entailed,

I don't chalk it up to merely "human". I felt sorry for each and every one of them.......

[Teaser]

6. Who says they suffered?

This image of the long suffering wife of the serial "adulterer" is such sexist tripe. It was always within their power to move on if they so choose. They would simply have to give up the life to which they became accustomed. And, at least by the 70s, they probably would have gotten custody of the children and a very generous child support arrangement (by the standards most of us have).

[JeanGrey]

9. They suffered. A woman who lives with a man who isn't faithful,

usually suffers. You might like to pretend it isn't so but it is. I'm sorry you dislike women.

[Teaser]

12. Right to the ad hominem. Stay classy, Jean.

Please,join me in the 21st century. Not every marriage has to be about monogamy.
People marry for other reasons as well. And maybe that's what these women valued.

[JeanGrey]

13. Oh dear I have a feeling I don't want to join you.....

I think you are kidding yourself about the Kennedy women.

I'll do my best to stay classy..............

[Teaser]

15. Maybe, maybe not. I don't know them

and I'm not going to judge them as weak little puppets who were trapped in their marriage.
I suspect they were strong women who assessed their men, realized who those men were after they married them (if not before), and then made some decisions about what it was they valued in their relationship.

If, after making that decision, they suffered, well that is their choice. But I think they used the compromises they make to help with the life goals they had in mind. And that is strength, not weakness.

[JeanGrey]

16. That was a nice paragraph excusing the actions of a adultering

husband and putting the blame on the wife. Somehow I don't think they shared your views.

[BlueMTexpat]

22. They may also have loved them and did their part to hold the family together.

Times then were different than they are today. Men strayed and women covered up. Also, in my experience, the Catholic Church generally maintained to wives that somehow their husbands' behavior was the fault of the wives. There was no help to be had from that quarter.
I have no doubt that each one suffered, most especially those who did love their husbands in spite of the infidelity. I know of examples of similar episodes in my own family (not me!) and the choices to stay in similar situation were deliberate ones. IMO, some should have left and they ... and their children ... would likely have been better off. But the Kennedy womem, for the most part, made their choices to stay, whatever the reasons. Those choices should be respected.
Bad as infidelity is, there are far worse marital sins than infidelity alone, IMO. Failure or refusal to provide for the family, spousal and/or child abuse, including sexual abuse, various addictions, criminal behavior where others are physically hurt or defrauded would be showstoppers so far as I am concerned. I would find it hard to forgive infidelity myself, but if such an unimaginable thing should happen (my second husband and I have been married for 28+ years and we are now both senior citizens (65+)), I would at least consider the totality of my marital circumstances before giving up on the relationship altogether, so long as he too wanted to continue it.
I frankly find this article somewhat unworthy of the Guardian and I am usually a Guardian fan. It's more like something that Faux would concentrate on at such a time.

[dipsydoodle]

3. It's inevitable

that our, UK, press will print such articles - perceptions obviously differ out side the USA. All I can say that its bad taste to do this before the poor guy is buried.

[endarkenment]

5. this is shit. shameful shit.

[EFerrari]

23. Voyeurism in moralistic drag. n/t

[WinkyDink]

7. Re: Sexual behaviors: Christ cautioned against judging and stone-throwing. He was pretty clear,

though, about our duty to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and otherwise help the less fortunate. And He wasn't crazy about the greedy and the war-mongering.

I think the balance sheet for the Kennedy Bros. is on the side of good.

[Teaser]

10. "excesses"

the biggest problem I have with the Kennedy men is that they tried to fit into a monogamous framework when they so clearly were not suited for it. There's nothing wrong with having sex partners aside from your spouse, as long as your spouse is OK with it, or more hopefully, enjoys it as well.

The problem for the Kennedy's is the times in which they lived and the careers to which they aspired did not permit them the kind of marital/sexual arrangements other times and career paths would allow.

[JeanGrey]

11. Actually I think the problem was the wives weren't exactly

on board with it.

:eyes:

[Teaser]

14. most of them weren't, I'm sure.

and that's sad for them. Still, they didn't leave. When something makes you unhappy, you stop doing it.

[JeanGrey]

17. It's that simple, is it?

Gee I never knew that. I think I'll write a blog telling all the abused women in the world that they are simply stupid for not "stopping doing it".

I'm sure it will be a revelation.

[comtec]

18. I'm curious what would you have suggested to them at the time then?

All things being equal - that is assuming they could walk away and get equally well paying jobs, etc.

I'm curious what your advice is?

It's easy to pontificate and say "Shame, SHAME on you!" without actually giving a solution or alternative.

I genuinely want to know what you area suggesting their alternative is/was.

[JeanGrey]

26. I absolutely love the thought that the Kennedy women

only stayed because "they couldn't find good paying jobs".

[comtec]

33. i didn't suggest that at all

I asked what YOUR suggestion they should do is.
I wont let you just bitch about them and NOT provide a realistic alternative they could have done.
and I said all things being equal - that assumes they could have found careers of their own - so money and resources arent an obstical.

what should they have done?

[customerserviceguy]

19. You've made some good points

It isn't easy to just leave when you have a Catholic framework to your life. I know, I did it.

[JeanGrey]

27. I am aware of that. And I still say, maybe I am the only one,

how sorry I feel for the Kennedy women.

[The Hope Mobile]

31. Completely agreed, JeanGrey. nt

[nadine_mn]

34. I think perspective is missing

Marriage has not always been about finding true love. Marriage - especially among those of privilege or in upper classes - was many times a political, financial or some other transaction so to speak. If you actually loved the person you were married to, that was a bonus.

These women knew exactly what they were getting into - they were a product of their time and station. It doesn't mean it was fair but it was expected.

Feeling sorry for them is condescending and patronizing to the strong women who worked so hard to provide a legacy for what really mattered to them - their children. There is so much more to a marriage than sex and fidelity.

I used to think that if my husband ever cheated that was it - instant divorce. Well I have been married for 10 yrs now, he has never cheated but honestly - my love for him is stronger than any anger I would feel at him cheating. That is something in my marriage we have discussed and expressed our feelings. You have no idea what went on in the Kennedy marriages, so don't project your values on others.

[The Hope Mobile]

30. Unless you have kids and then you try to do what's right for them . . .

and the options were much more limited in that day.

The balance sheet is in favor of the Kennedys but don't kid yourself. The women were NOT okay with it. Nor were they weak or stupid. They were strong enough to do what they thought was the right thing, with smiles on their faces, even though it was certainly incredibly painful.

[JohnnyLib2]

20. Think of the timeline, folks. JFK and Jacqueline married in the 50s.

The others followed. Hayday of Hugh Hefner. Almost total blackout on JFK's straying by the press at the time. Vastly different gender roles from today.

IMO, the women played their role as political wives and were in touch with the times.

Some things have changed; some haven't.

[SharonAnn]

21. As practicing Catholics, divorce wouldn't have been easy to choose.

And with children, they may have believed that it was better that the family stayed together.

I know several families where this is the mode they chose to live. I know another where they were separated, but few people knew it (and this was in a realtively small town).

Remember that the 1950's and early 1960's were not quite like today. They really weren't.

As Dear Abby(?) said, "You have to decide if you're better of with him or without him."

That's still true today, though perhaps it may be easier to decide that you're better off without him. Depends. It always depends.

[Berry Cool]

24. The Kennedy women of that era (and even Vicki, to her extent) were from another age.

I think they knew what they were signing up for when they signed up for it. They were not naive Diana Spencers who truly believed they were marrying a Prince Charming who had saved and would save all his love for them all their lives. They knew they were marrying into the hard life of a good Catholic society wife, who was expected to look the other way when her husband had affairs, occupy herself with raising the children and looking after the house, stay true to him, and do whatever it took to cope with the situation, discreet drinking included (only becoming a sloppy drunk was unacceptable). They believed this was how things just were for women. You just dealt with it.

The Kennedy men were not the first or only men to have the opportunity to do great things mainly because they were the beneficiaries of supportive women who smiled through every heartbreak and kept the home fires burning no matter what their men did. They were merely a few of many beneficiaries of the philosophy that "behind every great man there's a great woman." Yes, a great and suffering woman, who stifles the pain and never takes the spotlight for herself.

I would like to think that we are moving into a new age in which we will see more great men whose wives are not merely enablers for their husbands' greatness, but great in their own right. And women who will not have to assume that being the wife of a great man means having to accept a basic inequality in the relationship, in which he gets to do whatever he wants while you have to toe the line, do the hard work and make the sacrifices.

I don't think we're there yet. I just hope we are someday. In the meantime, I take the Kennedy men as they were, flaws and all, and try to assess them honestly as products of their time.

[southernyankeebelle]

25. That was the way it was back then. The media never got involved in private matters. In a

way I wish we were back in that time. Believe me it still is going on. The wife all keeps her mouth shut if she wants to keep her status. That is the way it is. The one rule is don't bring public shame to the family.

[MissDeeds]

28. Poor taste for the Guardian to run this now

It's not news, no big reveal here, just flinging mud on a much loved statesman who has just died.

:eyes:

[The Hope Mobile]

32. Exactly! nt

[malletgirl02]

35. The Guardian

I think it is kind of interesting that they run this story, for all the talk of Europeans being more mature about sex than Americans. This just shows, it isn't always true. I'm also disappointed that the Guardian would print it. I thought the UK press was supposed to be better than the US.

[hedgehog]

29. Stay classy, Mr. Chancellor!