Feminist Foreign Policy: How Annalena Baerbock rejected Toxic Masculinity in Russia.
“If you don’t toughen up and learn to hold your liquor, you’ll never become a leading politician.”
That’s what advisors told Annalena Baerbock before her first trip to Russia.
A few years later, Baerbock is the German Secretary of Foreign Relations — and she still doesn’t drink vodka when meeting Russians.
She visited her Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov, in January. German conservatives already questioned her ability to deal with Lavrov before the trip.
The Russian politician, who is 30 years older than Baerbock and has already been in office for 18 years offered her a glass of vodka after lunch. She rejected politely.
But Lavrov didn’t accept that and played the toxic masculinity card by telling her to drink — but he wasn’t prepared for her response.
Baerbock replied, “If drinking vodka at noon is a test of toughness…I gave birth to two children.”
There are no reports on Lavrov’s reaction to this statement, but we can assume that he had no valid argument against that.
And this story is the perfect introduction to talk about “Feminist Foreign Policy.”
