I think Melania is extremely chic. Esthetically, that is. But I don’t know if she’s naturally elegant or if the merit should go to the stylist who dresses her or to her tall slim figure. What I mean is that I don’t know how she treats other people or what her table manners are like. In short, I don’t know if she really has class, knows how to handle herself in every situation and can adapt to those she interacts with.
You see, I’ve never met her. I’ve admired her outfits and how she carries herself, but I have no idea about whether she is an intelligent woman. Empathetic? Certainly not. What’s more, a woman who marries Trump and has the stomach to put up with his vulgar personality and his ideological barbarities, as well as his thuggish appearance, must be very determined. She must have suffered great misery in her native Slovenia, a country that freed itself from the yoke of Communism just 30 years ago. The proverb says that necessity is the mother of invention. I can’t say if she has any thoughts of her own because the first speech that she delivered as First Lady, in 2016, was plagiarized from the one Michelle Obama had given in 2008. I know that someone must have written it for her, but still, this doesn’t justify it.
Melania has been an elegant mannequin who has accompanied Trump, making him look even more ridiculous with his mop of yellow, teased hair, and his gaudy ties with the huge 1960’s knot. She hasn’t even managed to give him a more stylish look. It must be hard to live with someone like Donald, who exudes such spite and hatred that it has in fact, been able to incite violence. He’s shown himself to be incapable of accepting defeat, because he’s swollen with ego and has remained a spoiled and obtuse child.
It occurred to me that maybe she was paid and threatened by her husband to remain at his side. In fact, in her last speech her disagreement with his ignoble behavior comes across. “Always choose love over hatred” she said, as she bade us farewell, and “violence is never the answer, and will never be justified”.
It won’t be easy to remain by his side, even if he loads her down with Ralph Lauren outfits and Hermes handbags. But outfits and handbags become insupportable in the long run, especially if you can no longer wear them as First Lady but only as the ex-First Lady of the worst president that America has ever had.
It must be said that she’s had the opportunity of a lifetime, because otherwise, at the age of 50, she’d be nothing more than an ex-model like so many others. When she met him, she must have done the math, and it was obvious that convenience was the right choice. Clearly, she must have been a woman without dignity, who used her appearance to settle down and enjoy everything she had always wanted. And even though she considered herself an object, she didn’t number the man among the objects that she desired, merely a means to obtain them.
Despite her aloof demeanor and hard glance, she is submissive, a poor wretch; hopefully more uncaring than terrorized by her husband, even though I seem to have caught a look of fear in her eyes.
Her endurance however, has been admirable and we must admit that she has done well in her place. With a beautiful bronze face, like a false goddess.
Alan Friedman, the American journalist who is a commentator for RAI 1 in Italy, called her “an escort” and was labeled a sexist. He apologized, saying, “I made a bad joke”. In any case, there are many women who have practiced, and continue to practice, the oldest profession in the world either as wives or workers, because power has always been in the hands of men.
Now something has really changed: the world has seen it with Joe Biden’s election. His great merit has been to place the spotlight on authentic and empathetic women, from Jill Biden and Kamala Harris to the various cabinet members and colleagues that he has chosen.
Jill and Kamala have immediately shown that they have something to say, that they have plans and projects and that they are working with Joe Biden, not simply alongside him. That they aren’t just companions but leaders.
They’re not as elegant, young or beautiful as Melania, of course. Their faces and bodies are marked by the suffering and struggles that they have endured in order to get to where they are; like Lady Gaga, Jennifer Lopez and Katy Perry, who with their regal presence and divine voices have evoked history, conveyed feeling and reinforced the hope for the future of America. Real goddesses.
Translation by Grace Russo Bullaro
