Can a politician party?

You can ask the question, but it's not really helpful.

Let's look at it this way: It's no secret how Sanna Marin answers this question.

The 36-year-old Prime Minister of Finland wowed audiences in July when she attended the Ruisrock rock festival.

Leather jacket, cut-off denim shorts, cool boots – the organizer posted a picture of her, tagged her with a heart emoji, SPD politician Katarina Barley was one of more than 50,000 people who liked the photo.

In the comments there was almost nothing but praise.

One user wrote: "Legend".

One could also describe Sanna Marin as a political legend.

She is the leader of the Social Democratic Party in Finland and has been the country's prime minister since December 2019.

She is the youngest incumbent in Finnish history.

At the time of her election, she was also the youngest head of government in the world.

Just five years after graduating with a master's degree in public administration from the University of Tampere in Finland in 2017, she ruled her country.

When she took office, she wanted to fight climate change and strengthen the welfare state.

Then Russia invaded Ukraine, and Marin ushered in the end of Finland's freedom of association, which had been considered unbreakable for decades.

Finland officially applied for NATO membership in May this year.

She had proved her fearlessness by then at the latest.

She dares to dance

But now she has dared something really outrageous: Because whether this politician is allowed to celebrate – well, in the eyes of the public it all depends.

Rock festival, that was okay.

Now, however, videos have surfaced that weren't intended for the eyes of sensationalist social media users.

They show Sanna Marin at a private party with friends, she dances exuberantly in a black lace top with thin straps, her trusted party colleague Ilmari Nurminen can be seen in the background.

She even gets on the floor, on her knees, her arms behind her head, and later laughingly kisses a friend on the cheek.

The Finnish moderator Aleksi Valavuori immediately recognized what he saw as a serious problem and wrote on Twitter: "Some say it's cool ... , maybe among teenagers.

But for a responsible head of government in a country in crisis?

She is by far the most incompetent prime minister we've ever had.” Mikko Kärnä of Finland's Center Party, one of Marin's coalition partners, tweeted that “it would be wise for the prime minister to undergo a voluntary drug test”.

After the Finnish media interpreted this as a concrete demand, he demanded a correction from them.

He just said it would be wise.

For men, the question is not asked

The fact that some men think they have to deny women their skills because of their looks or their leisure activities is not surprising, but it is still misogynistic.

Because the question of whether a politician, an explicitly male one, is allowed to celebrate is not asked all too often.

With Boris Johnson, of course, but that was about the fact that he had celebrated excessive parties in the midst of strict corona lockdowns.

When the then Transport Minister Andreas Scheuer publicly demonstrated his DJ skills at a club opening in Passau in 2018, it was embarrassing, but nobody referred to his skills in this context.

And when Friedrich Merz happily stamped to the beat of the music at the Union summer party a few weeks ago, his team saved the Instagram story as a permanently available highlight.

In defense of Marin, there are now many videos on Twitter showing high-ranking politicians dancing in public situations.

Marin's video shows no public appearance.

"I'm upset that they've been made public," she said.

This is understandable in any case, if you know about the other standards that are applied to women.