No One Wants to See It

You've probably heard by now about Paul Withee, the high school football coach in Maine (51 years old, by the way), who had the good sense to decide to send his girlfriend a “candid photo” of himself in all his glory, and nothing else.

Somehow (and don’t expect me to explain) the coach accidentally posted the picture on his Facebook profile instead of posting it in a private section or emailing it to his girlfriend. And, as luck would have it, while it was only up 30 minutes, it was seen by several folks, including a parent of one of his players.

Not surprisingly, the coach is now an ex-coach and, while the school district has first opened and then closed (after the coach's resignation) an investigation, it can't be too happy about what transpired and what the incident says about the folks that it employs to teach and mold its students.

Most of the blogging and other commentary about the incident have focused on the perils of intermixing work, personal relationships, social media, and technological ignorance or ineptitude. I initially thought about doing the same, focusing on concerns about privacy settings and information mining that have been heightened lately regarding both Facebook and Google.

Then I had a thought.

What if Mr. Withee had just had the good sense to not take the picture in the first place?

Sure, we can talk about the dangers of social media use, whether it's a good idea or not to "friend" students or athletes if you're a teacher or coach, whether privacy settings and their constant changes on social media sites and search engines make it difficult, dangerous, and intrusive to use the internet. But the bottom line here is, if Withee hadn't decided that his girlfriend would want to see the photo, and if he hadn't had the ability to take it and then try to send it to her, then no one would be none the wiser.

In the good old days, Withee wouldn't have had the ability (or inability as the case may be) to disgrace himself and convert himself from a successful coach to an unemployed one in the blink of a digital camera. At best, he could have tried to take a Polaroid of himself and slip it to his gal, or stick it in the mail. Eventually, he would have probably been done in by an inappropriate comment or suggestion, but the entire world would have never known.

Idiots are, and always have been, idiots. It's just that technology makes it easier for everyone to know exactly who they are. Parents, students, employers, the government. Everyone with a cell phone has a digital camera and every buffoon with an email account or a Facebook page has the ability to publish to the world anything they want.

Even if nobody else wants to see it.

Would you want a nude photo of this man on your Facebook page?

Withee was duly "embarrassed", "ashamed", and "humiliated" by the incident and said that he had never done anything like that before. While there is plenty of reason to not believe that, simply put, once was one time too many.

It's real simple, guys. As much as you like to think they do, no one, and I mean no one, needs to see a photo of you and/or "it." No matter what your wife, girlfriend, or significant other says, they don't need to see it, and aren't as impressed as they let on. No matter how tempted you are, no matter what a good idea you think it is, don't take that picture.

The best explanation is not having to explain.

The Emperor's New Clothes in the Digital Age

"But he isn't wearing anything at all!"

While reading articles this week about OSU football coach Jim Tressel's resignation and an op ed piece in the New York Times about the Syrian government's attempts to squelch the use of the internet by that country's dissidents, I was struck by how similar, and similarly naive, the reactions of both have been to media in the digital age.

Much as the emperor's tailors hoodwinked him into believing that his fine garments could only be seen by those smart enough, or worthy enough of his station, to see them so too both the Ohio State administration and the Syrian regime seem to think that despite the explosion of communication technology and instant news, whether via Facebook, Twitter, or on-line publications, it's still business as usual when it comes to the dissemination of information.

"You only need to know what we tell you," they seemed to say, "and that should be good enough." Unfortunately for both, however, news is not something that can be easily controlled these days, whether via a press conference or security checks asking dissidents if they "have a Facebook" on their laptops.

Today there are millions of children itching to expose the emperors for what they are -- naked posers. And they're increasingly willing to do it at the cost of their careers, or even their lives.

While this is somewhat understandably lost on the despotic government in Syria, the naivete of those in charge at Ohio State, particularly its President Gordon Gee and its Athletic Director Gene Smith, both of whom are among the highest paid college administrators in their positions in the country, is astonishing.

Tressel's transgressions certainly aren't -- after all, he's been cheating for 20 years now. Perhaps the only surprise is that, with that much practice at plausible deniability, he finally got caught.

As news slowly leaked out that Tressel knew of his players' NCAA infractions, failed to inform the administration or the NCAA about them despite his obligation to do so, and then lied to the NCAA on reporting forms about the absence of violations, Gee and Smith were faced with two choices: realize that the jig was up and try to salvage some part of the football program's (not to mention the academic institution's) reputation; or pretend that Emperor Tressel really was wearing the finest sweater vest ever created, invisible to all who weren't worthy of seeing it.

That they chose the later course, and the way that they did it, bowing and scraping at the Emperor's feet, makes for great, though squeamish, theatre.

Not much doubt after that about who was running the asylum, the lengths to which the OSU administration would go to hold on to Tressel, or the fact that Gee and Smith had gone "all in" with the strategy that they could convince the press that it was time for everyone to move on, nothing more to see.

It wasn't Facebook or Twitter that ultimately took down Tressel, and presumably left Gee and Smith to try to cover their tracks by forcing his resignation, but rather Yahoo, Ohio State's own student newspaper, The Lantern, and Tressel's damning emails.

While the editor of The Lantern hasn't actually been harmed yet for his journalistic integrity, not surprisingly he has been threatened. And, no, not even this University of Michigan fan would go so far as to compare the ruthlessness of the Syrian government to Buckeye Nation. But the similarly naive approach to the dissemination of information in the digital age is certainly there.

The lesson that should be learned, maybe not for Gee or Smith, certainly not for Tressel, is that "the news" is increasingly an amorphous being with a life of its own. It can no longer be controlled or even managed, only explained and ultimately acknowledged.

We may be facing a similar situation in our state as information and rumors slowly leak out about WVU football's Dauphin Prince's (Dana Holgorsen) escapades at a local casino, and perhaps elsewhere. One can only hope that Mountaineer A.D. Oliver Luck, who appears to be very bright and media savvy, will take a different approach than Smith and Gee did, although the early signs do not look good. At least odds are that Luck won't wear a bow tie at his press conference, if there is one.

Sing The Changes

I've felt more than the usual push-pull over work, this blog and other social media venues, and life in general over the past few weeks -- issues that I've debated whether I should or should not share in any forum other than conversations and emails with family and friends.

Cindy and I watched "The Social Network" the week before last and afterwards, putting aside questions of how much was fact and how much fiction in the film, we discussed the very real issue of whether social networking, particularly Facebook but to some extent blogs as well, has become a substitute for genuine relationships and the honest expression of emotions.

Two predilections are at work in social media that seem to undermine interpersonal relationships and the need to communicate simple truths or profound thoughts: first, the compulsion to post regularly one's status on Facebook; and second, the need to post regularly to a blog, lest it become a blog without readers. Both, as the movie seems to conclude, are the antithesis of genuine communication and are at best a poor substitute for the personal sharing of substantive thoughts, ideas, and emotions.

These critiques caused considerable personal introspection last week. We received a call last Sunday morning informing us that a good friend of Kelsey's had died in a rappelling accident in California.  Matt was a wonderful young man with an infectious smile and a twinkle in his eye. He had battled some substantial demons in his life and had won; through determination and pain, no doubt, but I wouldn't have put it past Matt to have charmed the Devil himself as well.

The news of Matt's death hit our entire family hard. Kelsey had stayed in touch with Matt and they had gone hiking and rappelling in West Virginia over the Christmas break. Matt had always been exceedingly kind to Ethan, even when it would have been easier to simply treat him as the annoying little brother. They had seen each other at a 5K last year and Matt told Ethan he hoped they'd run into each other again soon. I had only seen Matt twice in the last five years, but for both Cindy and me, Matt's place in our children's lives as they went through middle and high school made the news tough to take and last week a long and emotional one.

During the week I kept my Facebook posting to a minimum and made no direct references either to Matt or to what we were going through as a family. The last thing I wanted to do was to appear to attempt to take ownership of his life, his passing, or the incredible grief that I knew his family was feeling.

After reading an impossibly positive and life-affirming story about Matt last week and then attending a celebration of his life on Saturday at which the warmth, compassion, courage, and caring of those who spoke about Matt was awe inspiring, I decided to post something here about Matt and honor and celebrate his life.

These thoughts aren't very original and are often repeated at times like this. But they are all things that Matt taught us in his too short thoroughly lived life:

Tell those that you love that you love them, sincerely and incessantly.
Enjoy creation, regardless of by Whom or how or why you believe it was created. Preferably in its wildest, most unspoiled and majestic state.
Embrace change.
Be kind to strangers.
Serve the less fortunate.
Play and don't keep score.
Love Life.

And next time, don't change your status, write a letter to a friend. In longhand. Don't "Like" a post. Give the person a call. Don't admire the pictures in someone's photo album. Go take your own.

There were a lot of wonderful quotes that were shared over the past two weeks regarding Matt and the impact that he made on a lot of people. I'm more pop culture than high culture, though, so rather than e.e. cummings or Bertrand Russell I give you some Paul McCartney, in honor of Matt:

Sing your praises
As you're sleeping
Feel the quiet
In the thunder.
Sing the changes
Calling over.
Everybody has a sense of
Childlike wonder.