Seriously? Lance Armstrong is going to sit down with Oprah Winfrey to confess what everyone already knows, that he took performance-enhancing drugs to win his Tour de France titles. And it’s going to be taped? And people will watch it? Why?
Because Shame is Fame™. What used to be somebody’s downfall can now be their windfall.
Let’s take a look at the highlights of what Mr. Armstrong might be confessing to:
- Cheating (his opponents, his fans, his sport)
- Lying (to his supporters, to regulators and to the legal system)
- Attacking whistleblowers
- Fraud
- Drug trafficking
And he is just the latest in what has become a long line of celebrities who have been exposed as cheats, swindlers, home wreckers, bigots, thieves, drunk drivers, abusers and so on.
There once was a time when a big enough scandal would effectively end a celebrity’s career. But that’s not the case any more. Today, celebrities have the Prime Time Confessional to absolve them of their sins.
And how fitting that he’s going to be confessing to Oprah. She has become our nation’s benevolent Grand Inquisitor, and she’s perfect for the role. Her public persona is so sweet, warm and kind that, if she forgives you, a nation follows.
From there, the penitent celebrity has a number of places (s)he can go. There’s the tell-all book and talk shows, of course. There’s also: reality TV, film roles, speaking engagements, public appearances, TV punditry and more, I’m sure.
And what’s even more dismaying, some regular folks have achieved their initial fame through shame, fleeting though it often is. Their prospects are mostly limited to reality TV.
All of this is a sign that there’s something wrong in our culture. I’m in favor of us loving and forgiving family members and friends for their misdeeds, but shouldn’t we maintain a public consequence for wrongdoing? We can’t rely on the legal system to deliver a fitting punishment since we all know that the law is consistently obfuscated by the lawyers of wealthy defendants.
Shun celebrities for wrongdoing
For better or worse, celebrities are icons for our society. They are cultural representatives. The unwritten laws governing them also govern us.
How you treat others, how you conduct yourself in this world, matters to us as a society. We need unwritten moral laws to keep us in check as individuals. Watching TV, buying books or movie tickets is one of the ways we change those unwritten laws over time.
If we don’t shun lying and cheating celebrities, we weaken that moral law and make it easier, as individuals, to lie to and cheat one another. If we fail, our society moves toward corruption.