After her affair with President Bill Clinton was made public, Monica Lewinsky survived a national political scandal to become a public figure and anti-bullying crusader. Lewinsky graduated from Lewis & Clark College in 1995 with a degree in psychology. Later that year, she became an intern in the office of White House Chief of Staff Leon Panetta, before moving to a paid position in the White House Office of Legislative Affairs. Over the next year and a half, Lewinsky had an affair with Clinton. When Clinton was investigated for allegations of sexual harassment and misconduct during his years as governor of Arkansas, Lewinsky's name surfaced. When details of their affair came to light, Lewinsky became the target of harassment and public ridicule, later describing herself as “patient zero of online harassment.”  

Facing legal fees from her representation in the Clinton impeachment hearings, Lewinsky gave interviews, sold the rights to her life story, and in 1999 created The Real Monica, Inc., a line of designer handbags. In 2006 she earned a master’s degree in social psychology from the London School of Economics but continued to struggle finding work due to her notoriety. In 2014, she returned to the public eye with an essay for Vanity Fair titled "Shame and Survival," a critique of the culture that humiliated and shamed her. The following year, she gave a TED talk on internet harassment and became strategic advisor for Bystander Revolution, an anti-bullying organization. Lewinsky has participated in a number of discussions about her affair with Clinton and its impact on her mental health and wellbeing. In 2019, on Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, she and Oliver discussed the problem of public shaming and how her situation might have been different if social media had existed when the scandal broke. Later that year, she started Alt Ending Productions. In 2020, Lewinsky was a co-producer of the third season of the television program American Crime Story, which portrayed the Clinton-Lewinsky affair and its aftermath.