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Very, very true.......comparing some of them to celebrities like Lindsay Lohan makes a world of sense. Public figures make for bad role models as often as not. Heck, we nickname Brett Favre "God" after all, but the joke exists for a reason......and it's not because he's under-hyped.
Saints in short supply
By John Gonzalez
Inquirer Columnist
Alex Rodriguez is a lot of things - narcissistic, smug, impossibly wealthy. Turns out he's a softy for children, too. After he admitted taking steroids during a teary-eyed ESPN interview, Rodriguez said coming clean (so to speak) was partly about the kids.
"And, uh, I also, more importantly, have a chance to, you know, tell the story to kids so they can learn from my mistake," Rodriguez said.
Yes, yes, of course. Now kids will surely zig where Rodriguez zagged. (Had he remained silent, I fear high schoolers everywhere might have left their girlfriends to shack up with Madonna.)
Not long after Rodriguez's lame "Greatest Love of All" rendition, President Obama took a time-out from talking about the tanking economy to answer a question on the A-Rod mess.
"The thing I'm probably most concerned about is the message that it sends to our kids," the president said during his news conference.
Democrats and Republicans surely nodded in unison. If there's one thing everyone agrees on, it's that this role-model business is super-serious stuff.
And it is. Which is why we should really stop entrusting the gig to athletes and celebrities.
Two things invariably happen when guys like A-Rod - or Michael Phelps or Charles Barkley or Jamal Anderson or [insert name here] - screw up. First, everyone recoils. That's natural. When someone douses himself in gasoline and then flicks a Bic, you stand back. You watch, but you stand back.
Next - and here's the part I'll never understand - people wag disapproving fingers at the guy who just self-immolated. The reaction isn't merely visceral, and it runs deeper than simple schadenfreude. Our reflexive responses are rooted in the fatuous notion that if kids find out the famous are flawed, their wee heads will pop off.
Personally, I don't think the young'uns are that daft or delicate. They've been to TMZ and With Leather. They know all about the exploits of Lindsay and Britney. They're fully aware that celebrities are imperfect.
The question, then, is when will we stop being so disingenuous (or are we just naive)? When will we stop pretending that public figures should be saints even though they never have been?
Golden boy Brett Favre had a pain-pill problem, and so did champion of the far right, Rush Limbaugh. Kobe Bryant and Magic Johnson were painted as stand-up guys - then both were exposed for marital infidelities, among other things. The current president of the United States admitted to using drugs during his youth. The guy he replaced copped to having a drinking problem at one time. And the man who came before both of them did something very naughty in the Oval Office - then lied about it.
And back in the mid-1990s, there was a popular former football star who did commercials and movies. Then he got himself in trouble. Went by the name of O.J. something.
The list goes on. Point is, we all know the deal. History has taught us that outsourcing the role-model job - especially to pro athletes - is beyond stupid.
But we do it anyway. No matter how many times they fib or obfuscate, we pull the shock-and-outrage bit because - for reasons surpassing understanding - we hold public figures to higher standards. We criticize today's failures and pine for yesteryear (even though yesteryear was just as messed up) because that's what we've always done.
When I was a kid, my dad told me stories about how great the old Yankees were. He grew up in the Bronx, and he was a big Bombers fan. (That was his greatest defect.) To him, Mickey Mantle was a "hero" - even though biographers revealed that the Mick was a womanizer who pickled his liver after camping out on barstools across America.
Like so many, my father wrongly expected too much from people he never knew. That aside, I'll say this: Dad was one fantastic role model.
By John Gonzalez
Inquirer Columnist
Alex Rodriguez is a lot of things - narcissistic, smug, impossibly wealthy. Turns out he's a softy for children, too. After he admitted taking steroids during a teary-eyed ESPN interview, Rodriguez said coming clean (so to speak) was partly about the kids.
"And, uh, I also, more importantly, have a chance to, you know, tell the story to kids so they can learn from my mistake," Rodriguez said.
Yes, yes, of course. Now kids will surely zig where Rodriguez zagged. (Had he remained silent, I fear high schoolers everywhere might have left their girlfriends to shack up with Madonna.)
Not long after Rodriguez's lame "Greatest Love of All" rendition, President Obama took a time-out from talking about the tanking economy to answer a question on the A-Rod mess.
"The thing I'm probably most concerned about is the message that it sends to our kids," the president said during his news conference.
Democrats and Republicans surely nodded in unison. If there's one thing everyone agrees on, it's that this role-model business is super-serious stuff.
And it is. Which is why we should really stop entrusting the gig to athletes and celebrities.
Two things invariably happen when guys like A-Rod - or Michael Phelps or Charles Barkley or Jamal Anderson or [insert name here] - screw up. First, everyone recoils. That's natural. When someone douses himself in gasoline and then flicks a Bic, you stand back. You watch, but you stand back.
Next - and here's the part I'll never understand - people wag disapproving fingers at the guy who just self-immolated. The reaction isn't merely visceral, and it runs deeper than simple schadenfreude. Our reflexive responses are rooted in the fatuous notion that if kids find out the famous are flawed, their wee heads will pop off.
Personally, I don't think the young'uns are that daft or delicate. They've been to TMZ and With Leather. They know all about the exploits of Lindsay and Britney. They're fully aware that celebrities are imperfect.
The question, then, is when will we stop being so disingenuous (or are we just naive)? When will we stop pretending that public figures should be saints even though they never have been?
Golden boy Brett Favre had a pain-pill problem, and so did champion of the far right, Rush Limbaugh. Kobe Bryant and Magic Johnson were painted as stand-up guys - then both were exposed for marital infidelities, among other things. The current president of the United States admitted to using drugs during his youth. The guy he replaced copped to having a drinking problem at one time. And the man who came before both of them did something very naughty in the Oval Office - then lied about it.
And back in the mid-1990s, there was a popular former football star who did commercials and movies. Then he got himself in trouble. Went by the name of O.J. something.
The list goes on. Point is, we all know the deal. History has taught us that outsourcing the role-model job - especially to pro athletes - is beyond stupid.
But we do it anyway. No matter how many times they fib or obfuscate, we pull the shock-and-outrage bit because - for reasons surpassing understanding - we hold public figures to higher standards. We criticize today's failures and pine for yesteryear (even though yesteryear was just as messed up) because that's what we've always done.
When I was a kid, my dad told me stories about how great the old Yankees were. He grew up in the Bronx, and he was a big Bombers fan. (That was his greatest defect.) To him, Mickey Mantle was a "hero" - even though biographers revealed that the Mick was a womanizer who pickled his liver after camping out on barstools across America.
Like so many, my father wrongly expected too much from people he never knew. That aside, I'll say this: Dad was one fantastic role model.
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