Amal Clooney is one of Time Magazine’s Women of the Year. Yes, it’s only March, so the “of the year” stuff is a bit odd, but Time is trying to tie it into Women’s History Month and International Women’s Day. Other “women of the year” covers include Kerry Washington, Kacey Musgraves and Zahra Joya (in an interview conducted by Angelina Jolie). Amal’s cover is the one getting the most hype. Superficial comment: she looks especially pretty with a strong lip color! Amal’s Time interview was conducted by one of her clients, Nobel Prize-winning journalist Maria Ressa. The piece is mostly about Amal’s legal work and the kind of work she’s drawn to (working with women who have faced injustice), but she also talks about her marriage and her kids a little bit. Ella and Alexander turn five years old this summer! You can read the full piece here. Some highlights:
She gets too close to her clients: “I definitely work on cases that I feel passionate about. And I don’t agree with advice that I’ve been given over the years where people have said that you shouldn’t get too close to your clients. I do these cases because I believe in the clients… I am then the kind of person who’s available anytime and who goes as far as I need to go to try to protect them.
Why human-rights law: “I’m responding to what I see happening in the world. A world where the guilty are free, and the innocent are imprisoned—where the human-rights abusers are free, and those who report on the abuses are locked up. As a lawyer, I can do something about that. Or I can at least try. So my work is focused on trying to help liberate victims and prosecute perpetrators—and by extension, our foundation’s work is trying to really do that at scale and globally.
Her work on The Clooney Foundation: “We call what we do waging justice for victims of human-rights abuses. Because justice doesn’t just happen—you have to wage it; you have to bend the arc toward it. We try to do that by holding those who are responsible to account. So the methodology is to expose, but also to punish and remedy. And it is a result of both my experience and the many years George has also spent working on these issues.
What it’s like being married to George Clooney: “Marriage has been wonderful. I have in my husband a partner who is incredibly inspirational and supportive, and we have a home filled with love and laughter. It is a joy beyond anything I could ever have imagined. I feel so lucky to have found a great love in my life, and to be a mother—this is how I get my balance.
And what it’s like seeing her work denigrated in the media because she’s married to George Clooney: “In terms of an increased public profile, I think all I can do is try to turn the spotlight to what is important. That can definitely benefit some clients. If I am at a work function and reporting of it focuses on irrelevant issues, there’s not much I can do about that. Since I can’t control it, my approach is just not to dwell on it and just get on with my work and my life and hope that attitudes will catch up. And I do actually feel like there is a female solidarity that has built up on these issues where other women will sort of call that out in a way that maybe wouldn’t have happened five or 10 years ago. So attitudes are changing.”
When I started this write-up, I thought that the most interesting or gossip-worthy quotes would be about her marriage, but this quote stopped me cold: “justice doesn’t just happen—you have to wage it; you have to bend the arc toward it.” That sh-t is profound. I sat here thinking about that for ten solid minutes. It’s not that the arc of history bends towards justice all on its own. There are people on the ground, people fighting in the streets, people lobbying and crying out and standing up, all to bend the arc. Amal is a real one.
Cover and IG courtesy of Time Magazine.
