gossip culture.
I didn’t really have a response when I first heard that John Edwards cheated on his wife. Cheating is common enough, and I tend to presume all political leaders have extra-marital affairs. But what’s prompted me to write is the mania that’s followed, the outrage at his bad conduct, the fuss over his attempts to cover up such a personal screw-up (as opposed to a political screw-up). A quick search pulls up headlines like, “John Edwards fiddled while America burned” and “Edwards’ hometown dismayed by revelations of affair.” It bothers me because I’m not sure what it will take for the American public to recognize the disconnect between private life and political competence.
This story seems to exist not because Edwards has trouble with fidelity but because we’re a nation of gossips. A public figure’s private life isn’t our business, but we continue to insist that it is. Forget that our nation thrived under the presidency of a notorious sex fiend, or that it suffers under the presidency of someone who is ostensibly faithful. We shrug at the issues that matter, preferring instead to focus on the issues that are easiest for us to understand (or so we believe), issues that trigger the sort of knee-jerk response that will almost certainly be shared by friends and neighbors. Like infidelity. We’ve got a whole arsenal of platitudes on that subject.
If we actually cared about infidelity, we’d give it some real thought. We’d question why it’s so common. We’d look to other attitudes, attitudes we neither share nor understand. We’d allow for a more nuanced discussion, perhaps find solutions or new ways to think about intimacy and fidelity. If there’s anything I’ve learned as a prostitute, it’s that our attitudes toward marriage are simplistic, even naive, and that simplistic thinking is encouraged and exploited by the gossip media. But then, I’m not convinced it’s the cheating that matters to us so much as the power of judging and condemning strangers. That’s what keeps the gossip rags going – they feed the public with a steady stream of fallen heroes, the powerful at their weakest, the beautiful at their ugliest, the famous at their most damaged. It makes us feel superior when we’re feeling otherwise insecure. Gossip culture has surpassed religion as the ultimate opiate.
The Marquis de Sade, with his talent for weaving political commentary with necrophilia, feels eerily relevant here with his remarks on mass distraction in Juliette (1797). (And I suppose I’m invoking de Sade, rather than Huxley or Marx, because there’s something excellent in crossing de Sade’s filth with Edwards’ pretty, hangdog face.) In a lecture to King Ferdinand of Naples, Juliette denounces the king’s policy of keeping the subjects of his kingdom distracted. “You fear the powerful eye of genius. That is why you encourage ignorance,” she says. “It’s opium you feed your people, so that, drugged, they do not feel their injuries.” Ignorance is the opiate of the masses here, and since there is nothing to be gained from intelligent thought, “a taste for trivial things replaces a taste for great things.” Much like gossip, our own opiate. We skew our tastes down and shovel it in, one headline at a time.
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I’m going to cleanse my brain with a picture.
By Akif Celebi
Filed under: pressing thoughts | 40 Comments
Tags: edwards
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I’ve been seeing Twitters and comments about cheating and cheaters and it’s kind of pissing me off. Generally speaking, these are coming from people who are not married and are under 30. While I think idealism is lovely and I wish for the time I too was more idealistic, I can say as someone who has cheated, that I hope these same people who are seem so judgmental now never have to walk the path I have traveled.
I got married never thinking I’d ever cheat. Life happens. My reasons are detailed ad infinitum on my blog, so I won’t go into them here. Our ideas about marriage, as you said so eloquently above, are simplistic. Such complex human interaction reduced to thou shalt or shalt not.
And cheaters fall into many categories. I have had engaged men come on to me. Engaged men whose fiancees had no idea that their intended was already straying. For some reason this infuriates me while a man who has been married for several years and finds himself in a sexless but not loveless marriage and doesn’t want to go unfulfilled does not and seems perfectly understandable. I have even had men who were cheating on their wives ask me to lie to their girlfriends since somehow they neglected to mention their marital status to these women. Again, obnoxious to me.
Our sex positive community seems to be going through many upheavals these days, and I think we should at least attempt to realize that cheating like other behaviors isn’t necessarily a giant evil warranting a scarlet letter and should be looked at on an individual basis.
Possibly more appalling to me than the condemnation and judgment of John Edwards was the criticism against his wife:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lee-stranahan/say-it-aint-so-elizabeth_b_117867.html
“Say It Ain’t So, Elizabeth — You Knew But Supported His Run For President?”
When I saw that, I thought, surely it must have been written as a satire, or in jest. The fact that these two, in their marriage, have reached whatever agreement or situation they desired, should be enough. It was certainly enough for them, so it should be enough for the rest of us. Two highly intelligent, strong willed individuals who have struck whatever balance they could in their marriage – and we, the gossiping tabloid-rabid public can’t accept their arrangement? She knew, and she knew it could be a liability in his run for President, so instead of supporting him she should have put an end to it?
I was a little more heartened when I read Earl Ofari Hutchinson’s piece in support of Edwards, also on HuffPo. But the negative has been outscreaming the positive, tenfold.
I was going to wonder out loud if its progress that we’re crucifying the man and not the woman here (then I read Wendy’s comment…damn). What’s that line in the Beauty Myth that goes ‘if this is progress, its only of the most horrible kind’?
*standing fucking ovation*
hear hear! It drives me insane that people can not see that there is no direct correlation to one’s personal life and public/political beliefs. How does the fact that a man cheated on his wife have any relevance to the price of oil? How does it relate to international politics? NOT AT ALL! I can’t for the life of me understand why our nation cares so deeply about political figures and their extra marital affairs but won’t even consider having impeachment hearings for obviously treasonous acts.
I equate the uproar over Edwards’ and his wife’s personal (should be) private problems with the apparent need many people have for condemning homosexuals. How does what one person does in his or her bedroom have any bearing on my life? It doesn’t. That plain and simple. It has not affected his political stance.
However, the ostensibly monogamous leader you mentioned earlier does allow his beliefs to influence politics. Consider the latest push to make IUDs and BCPs defined as abortions. Now that’s mixing personal with political and that’s something I can’t abide.
This only shows again how deeply vulnerable to blackmail and control the political system is. How can somebody expect that these people are actually doing what they are voted in for. Just one visit to a Heidi Fleiss clone and you´re owned by whoever is running the establishment and (sure as a male O) taping it.
Oh and Dubya and faithful? Don´t even go there! Ganon, College Dubya the Cheerleader, his homosexual escapades in Skull&Bones fraternity. Please.
Ahhhh… I think your are missing the point. In a “Leave it to Beaver” type marriage, the spouse is supposed to be the most important person in the other spouse’s life. America’s natural reaction to cheating is pain. How could anyone hurt someone they supposedly love like that. Truth is, we don’t know and probably never will know what their marriage situation is or was at that time. We are making an ASSumption. Edwards lied to his wife. He lied to the American people. It kind of makes you wonder what else said person lied about or would be willing to lie about. You can’t separate that from the person. Oh, now he’s a politician! He’ll always exhibit good and ethical behavior.
Quite frankly, I could care less that Edwards had an affair. I could care less what your sexual preferences and behavior is, but if you lie about it, then I don’t want you in charge of the people who make laws and have the guns to enforce them.
I’m not sure about the whole gossiping thing though. I think you are right. It’s in our nature to gossip, and I’m sure this whole thing is confounded by an election year. I’m just trying to avoid that whole “let’s cast blame on the other foot” ideal because this involves sex…
Wendy,
That is even stranger considering the source, if they are indeed one and the same. (You may need to register to follow the link since deviantart and this photographer display a lot of erotic art and art nudes.)
http://stranahan.deviantart.com/
I think Wes has a point in that public outrage over an affair comes down to feeling betrayed that the candidate lied to us. But dishonesty in one’s personal relationships doesn’t necessarily correlate with integrity in making political decisions. Seriously, if you have a problem with infidelity, then I suggest you not get romantically involved with John Edwards, Bill Clinton, or any of the many other philandering politicians. Since your chances of that are already slim to none, it seems wholly irrelevant.
It is not surprising at all. What he did as a private citizen is between him and his wife. However, the instinctive lying about it and covering up is unfortunately typical but still abhorrent – someone who lies about that to get ahead, what will they say in the white-house when caught in something big (like Nixon, Agnew, Clinton or Dubya) – come to think of it, they are all pretty much the same. Edwards isn’t smart enough to figure out a way to spin it to his advantage though, so I guess that means he would have made a lousy president.
Tess, it could very well be the same person. Which wouldn’t surprise me. Because, you see, having an enlightened and/or open minded attitude about sex is only for the menfolk. Right.
I found it particularly appalling that one right-wing columnist and blogger (Leslie Carbone) wrote up the Edwards affair and referred to the girl involved only as “Edwards’ Slut”. I know nothing about the girl hesrelf— Gawker and Jezebel claim that in the early ’80s she dated Jay McInerney, went to nightclubs, and ran with his NYC crowd briefly, which apparently means that’s she’s permanently branded as a slut in the blog world. The girl seems to have…oh…fallen in love with and had an affair with a man of some accomplishment and charm. This now opens her up to permanent condemnation by the gossip/moralista types.
[Make a note, too: I'm not a political supporter of Edwards. I voted against Kerry and Edwards. But I find this entire "scandal" to be yet another example of why I despise the world of gossip and moralistas...]
I refuse to believe that Americans are particularly dumb or extremely interested in the sex lives of politicians or celebrities.
Our media digs up salacious entertainment in lieu of giving real news. People are for the most part isolated and feel that they are the only ones who think that everyone is apathetic.
It isn’t true. People are working every day to end this crap. But that will never be on TV.
What I worry about is that we are all sitting here screaming about it on the internet but don’t get up and join movements. The internet seems to be a venting spot for frustration when the real venting should take place on the streets.
Yes, yes, yes … but. Yes: I had all the same reactions about this being the lead story in our “leading” newpapers (who had apparently sat on it until the National Enquirer published) – no more news than “dog bites man” would be.
But: Didn’t the Edwards make their marriage into a campaign theme? Didn’t he go prime time with his mea culpa? The whole circus is sickening – but don’t they – or at least he – have some share in bringing it to town?
I respectfully disagree with you, Debauchette, Cablegirl, and others who say it’s about the salaciousness of the incident. In the law, what Edwards did is called “opening the door.” When Edwards made his fidelity and family life a campaign issue, his standing by his wife and not cheating on her became fair game. If his allegation is that he’s a leader because he has strong “family values” then we as a citizenry can scrutinize that. Contrast that with McCain who did cheat on his wife and left her for a beer heiress, but hasn’t made his fidelity to his wife a focal point of his campaign, so it in turn hasn’t become much of a campaign issue. If you campaign on your “moral superiority,” then you need to back it up. If you don’t, expect this sort of response.
It’s not that we’re a nation of gossips, though that would be a much easier explanation. It’s that we abhor a politician who run a campaign based on his supposed virtue and then it turns out that the vice he was campaigning against was his own (c.f. Spitzer and Craig, but not Frank, with the Gobie scandal, who dealt with the issue appropriately). It should be noted again that Clinton’s troubles weren’t with the blowjobs he got, it was with the lies he told under oath. Easy to forget that when blowjobs are involved, but perjury remains a crime today. That there was an impeachment fiasco is a testament to an overzealous Republican party, but still, perjury was and is a crime, while getting a blowjob usually isn’t.
Wendy – it’s not that they had an “agreement” that galls, it’s that they presented something to the rest of us that wasn’t true and campaigned on that premise. If Edwards had campaigned on the premise “My wife and I have an understanding and I’m seeing on the side while she slowly dies of cancer, but she’s cool with it because she’s dying and it’s none of your business” he’d've gotten my vote, but I think I’m in the minority.
Of course I question the timing, as the DNC convention is coming up and now there are reports that Hillary would have won if Edwards had made this revelation earlier and… 1968 called, it would like its convention back, please.
it appears everybody else has the edwards conversation under control, so i just want to acknowledge that amazing picture that blanked my mind about anything i had to say about edwards
i agree with pitseleh – you’ve posted some amazing pictures, but this one sears into the brain.
pitseleh: oh good, i thought it was just me!
I believe we do live in a gossip culture. Look at the reality show phenomenon. I keep wondering if it’s a reaction to the loss of the small community where everyone knows everyone’s business.
It *is* an amazing photo.
thanks for writing this, you’re right on.
I do believe that people over-focus on politicians sex life’s – but you must admit that it is kind of annoying when “pro-family/family oriented” politicians end up being cheaters. There is an incredible level of hypocrisy there – much like an anti-gay politician getting caught having sex with men *cough* Larry Craig/Mayor West *cough*.
I like Edwards, but he did run his relationship with his dying wife into the ground – so, yeah, people will talk about it.
Nice picture!
Hmmm…I think people are so incensed or rather, obsessed by it because political figures and their campaigns (at least in the States where candidates have more individual character and thus, large and almost cult-like, followings – esp when compared with other nations with a similar form of gov’t) are built on the images of the all-American family (having a family is not contingent obvs, but helps) man/woman with all-American family values. Political culture outside of political science and academia does run on emotion-based opinions, not pure political ideology. Politicians are hardly ideologists. Their campaign success is largely contingent on majority support and when the average citizen hardly has an abstract idea about their own country’s constitution, or the real-time application and effects of the political platforms belonging to a candidate, the “personal” and “moral” character becomes one of the leading determinants for the voters. Sad, but true. We can blame it on the government, education system or just the elitist nature of the political community for not informing and including your average citizen in politics, bringing us to an era where the celebrity of the politician outweighs everything else. At the end of the day, I don’t think there’s a disconnect between political competence and private life, is that a detriment to responsible government? I don’t know but I do know that if people entrust politicians into being a “trustee” who makes a decision based on their moral judgment…scandals like cheating and lying to the press is definitely going to hurt your political career. But yes, I do agree with you on one thing which is – we are all gossips.
I always raise an eyebrow when “hypocrisy” becomes a mortal sin. True— it’s amusing to see family-values types caught with rent-boys, but hyprocrisy has always seemed to me to a very ordinary part of life. There are public pieties to be observed, public formulae to be repeated— all simply pro forma. That done, it should be professional accomplishment that matters. American politicians are expected to embody virtue rather than have technical skills or policy expertise, and so we condemn private lives instead of simply expecting discretion and a pro forma kind of respect for tradition. Only perfect people make good policy, Americans seem to believe— or at least that only “moral” people *should* make policy, lest the wrath of God fall on the country.
American voters expect “family” candidates. But we seem unwilling to accept a public, formal presentation of accepting conventional values and then get on to the more boring issue of policy. I’m guessing is that it’s the same fear of priests of old— a sacrificial offering with blemishes won’t be acceptable to the gods.
Hypocrisy is how one gets through daily life— something taken for granted until the last fifty years or so, when it suddenly became a mortal sin. One pays public, pro forma observance to conventional beliefs, then has a private life. Once upon a time, that was accepted and taken for granted. I suppose that in an age when politicians or public figures of any kind are treated as celebrities and offered up as embodying morality and public wish-fulfillment rather than technical expertise, that’s only to be expected.
people are writing and talking about john edwards because it’s a story. he made his personal life an issue the moment he used his wife’s cancer to his own political benefit. your post, and some of the subsequent comments, seems to imply that gossip is something that is being imposed on us by a manipulative media and exploitive politicians.
gossip is not something that’s imposed on us from above. human beings are social animals; it’s the primary reason that we have such big brains. i guarantee you that thousands of years ago there were neanderthal men standing around bragging about who has the biggest club and women gathered somewhere talking about how so-and-so keeps a messy cave. it’s human nature.
I will judge a political leader’s behavior by the way they vote for or against things. I will judge a political leader’s behavior by the laws they pass or veto. those alone will tell me all I need to know. but these things will not differ from their sexual behavior. they will match side by side. they are different windows- but they both look into the same soul, the same brain, the same person.
well, i agree with you. cheating to me is a normal thing- while i will not condone it, i wouldn’t condemn anybody for doing it. it’s none of my business. that being said, i can also agree with the idea that he did kind of bring it upon himself when he incorporated his family life in his campaigning etc. i feel bad for the dude, but by no means do i think he’s a complete piece of shit. life happens. we make choices, and these decisions have consequences. he’s not a fiend, just a human. we are all human, afterall. we really should not criticize our peers (sorta) for displaying traits that we ourselves have. it is hypocracy, it is a fact of life, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to NOT display such a behavior. sure, it is a story and people are just “chasing that skrillz” when they are writing these “John Edwards is a Slut” articles, but i just simply choose not to read them.
but really, all of that was not important. i just wanted to say was that the picture did anything but cleanse my mind.
My issue is not with his infidelity, but with his disregard for what it could potentially do to this country. Had he gained the democratic nomination, there would be no doubt who would win the election. That is infinitely irresponsible on his part. I don’t care what he did with his pants down, but I do care that he didn’t have enough scruples to think ahead of time about what he was doing not only to his wife, but to his supporters. I wasn’t a big fan, but I didn’t dislike him and I would have supported him.
I agree on the basic point though, that a persons personal life does not make his/her public life. The problem is that so many people DO believe that and I think it was his responsibility to act accordingly. If you are going to subject yourself to a life of politics, you know you are under scrutiny. I can’t get past the point that he still tried to make a go of it when he had to know this would come out at some point.
If this country could remove the proverbial stick from its ass, we wouldn’t have to worry about this kind of nonsense, but that’s not happening any time soon and John Edwards should have realized this before he acted out.
John Edwards had two Americas: the lofty plane that he and his wife existed on, and then the one for all us other dumb fucks. His problem was two fold. Not just his traveling dick, but the fact that it traveled while he was running for President and after Elizabeth was diagnosed with incurable, terminal cancer, knocked up the mistress, finangled to get a former campaign staffer to take the fall, and then induced supporters into paying them off with huge monthly stipends. And if we are to believe John Edwards latest “confession”, his wife knew about it, or, depending on which version, he told her in “installments”.
This has nothing to do with gossip. This is Common Sense 101. In other words, if you’re going to shit all over yourself, do it in private. However, if you’re going to do it in plain sight, the people around you are bound to raise a stink.
I suppose my feeling is this: I’m not going to vote for a politician because he has a stable marriage and I’m not going to dismiss a politician because his marriage is flawed. I care about his ability to do his job. The state of his marriage is just fluff. If someone can convince me that there’s a real link between a politician’s home life and his effectiveness as a leader, I’ll take his personal life more seriously. Until then, I’ll continue to believe that link is artificial and exploited by the gossip media.
As I see it, Edwards’ fuck-up is between him and his wife. It isn’t our business. That we *believe* it’s our business is rooted in the base impulse to gossip, and I think that gossipy impulse is why we’re so easily distracted by irrelevant issues and prone to elect less-than-competent leaders (with happy marriages!). As a country, we get a collective hard-on the moment someone slips, particularly when that slip-up is personal. But when civil rights are violated, when an administration fumbles (and lies), I see a lot of indifference. Probably because we’ve spent ourselves jerking off to the bevy of irrelevant headlines that crowd out the real news.
I think I’m just repeating myself.
Debauch, if John Edwards had not run for President and made his wonderful marriage and family the centerpiece of his campaign, I would agree with you. But he didn’t. This was a conscious choice that he and his wife made. They chose to keep his affair secret. They thought it would never come out. They knew what would happen if it did. Otherwise, why the lies and ongoing coverup? Their hubris and arrogance was exceeded only by their stupidity and their disdain for the voting public.
Two things.
First, he resolved it with his wife. Does that mean his marriage was a sham? To my mind, the survival of his marriage is a clear indication that it was strong in other areas. Some relationships survive this sort of betrayal, others don’t. And whether it’s one or the other is up to the people involved.
Second, shouldn’t there be a distinction between a desire to shield a (complicated) private life from the press and, say, a politician’s lies about his voting record? I’d rather save the word ‘disdain’ for times when, say, a hurricane hits New Orleans and the president can’t be bothered to respond to the disaster. That, to me, is real disdain for the public. Not some politician’s clumsy attempts to conceal the fact he diddled the videographer.
And I do think that’s important, saving our anger for the things that are truly unforgivable.
debauch, there are two different issues at work here. the first is whether or not john edwards’ affair is politically important. i disagree with the idea that we get “collective boners”. this is a nation of 300 million people; each of whom cares about john edwards personal life to a different degree. that’s democracy. you vote for who you want based on whatever you want; whether it be a politician’s stand on abortion, on tax rates, or on what color ties she wears. it’s part of the double-edged sword of living in a free society.
the other issue is press coverage. maybe it sems that “we” are obsessed with john edwards public life, but that’s just because if there’s a story then most media is going to cover it. it’s their job. the minute there is information that someone who once had a decent shot at getting the democratic presidential nominee had an affair with a staffer, and may have a child with that staffer, the press is going to cover it. would you rather live in a world where journalists made the decisions about what the public should and shouldn’t know? it may be unpleasant, but the alternative is much more so.
Sure, I agree with the former. Double-edged sword.
My concern is with the press coverage, seeing how it tends to sharpen the blade. You wrote, “Would you rather live in a world where journalists made the decisions about what the public should and shouldn’t know?” My response is that we already do.
i have to admit that i find your response somehwat less than satisfying. yes, the media act as gatekeepers. they are the ones doing the reporting, doing the writing, publishing the papers and producing the news broadcasts.
is there more coverage of things like the edwards affair than i would care to see? yes. i would much rather the media treated us like reasonable adults than sixth-graders gossiping in homeroom. but the question is: what’s an individual reporter to do? if you were an editor at the new york times would you just refuse to print this story? if you’re answer is yes, i would have to say that you’d be doing your job poorly.
I doubt I’ll be able to give a satisfying response because it’s a complex issue. The question here, as I see it, is ‘what qualifies as a story?’
There are, in theory, millions of potential stories all competing for our very limited attention. The judgment call, to my mind, is whether one story should be favored over another for space and attention. If the competition is between the cover-up of one man’s sex life and a cover-up related to the Iraq War, I’d go with the latter. But if I wanted to sell more copies or get more pageviews, I’d go straight to Edwards’ admitted indiscretions, which have all the makings of a Lifetime movie (virtuous wife, caddish husband, oddly named mistress, the term ‘baby daddy,’ and a finale of abject contrition).
So, yes, if I were an editor at the Times, I’d probably do a poor job. But I do take your point.
you’re absolutely wrong, deb. i find that response quite satisfying. we often complain about things in the collective; forgetting that it actually comes down to individuals making decisions and other individuals responding to those decisions.
i will say that i’d probably rather read the paper you’d edit as opposed to one filled with stories about politicians’ sex lives. although, i wouldn’t want to see a story like the edwards one completely ignored. it ought to be put ought there for people to make up their own mind; it just doesn’t need quite the amount of attention that comes with having a million 24 hour news programs.
Clearly, they’re together. But have they resolved it? With more revelations coming out each day that prove that JE is still lying, that’s hard to say. The New York Times is now on the hunt, and other outlets are as well. Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me.
The whole issue has made me quite sad, but I agree with you, it’s not up to us, it’s not my place, and honestly, while I feel sorry for all involved, I have no part to play in the story. Seeing him fall does not make me feel any better, nor does it change my mind about his politics. I often wish I were back in england, where a good cheating scandal almost seemed to help an official.
i often feel like the american public has been done a gross disservice by their media. they’re not great here in canada but they’re better it seems. i feel that the stories are a little less biased [except the usa bashing which really pisses me off. you can diss the bits of the politics you don't like but not the whole place] and that there is a little less combat involved in discourse.
it’s not (yet!) treason here if you disagree with the public policy on an inflammatory issue.
i think that all this celebrity baby/politician affair/xxx divorce/ etc stuff still has a place but it doesn’t need to have the prominence it does. the front and centreness of the candy.
that said, i get incredibly angry when i am watching fluff television and they cut to really violent newsbites with no warning whatsoever.
Makes you wonder even more about the myth of monogamy…