CLEVELAND - Tiger Woods is one of the wealthiest, widely admired and highly accomplished pro athletes in history. His skills on the golf course are nonpareil and his focus is stunning. But in spite of all that uncommonality with the average human being, he is and was always just a human being.Imagine that.
This past week has been one nightmare after another for the world's number one golfer. After a mysterious minor accident on Thanksgiving night, his perfectly cultivated public image and brand have sustained major damage. With several women claiming to have been sexually involved with the married Woods during the past few years, his sterling reputation has come under fire and his moral character ripped to shreds by the national media and the general public.
Quite simply, folks have labeled Woods a loser and a jerk for "destroying the sanctity" of his marriage. I have been appalled to hear people also say that Woods should never again be considered a role model because of the "transgressions" (as he put it in a statement on his blog) he committed against his family.
Yeah, okay.
Hey, I'm not advocating or endorsing Woods' behavior. I just think it's crazy that people, especially the media have spent the past 12 years building him up to all but be deified and in the process, they forgot that he was still just a person despite his colossal achievements in his sport. Sure, he's worth hundreds of millions of dollars and his career has been both groundbreaking and breathtaking. But he's still a person that made a mistake and guess what? Us humans tend to make mistakes, often the same mistakes over and over.
Woods has been deliberately vague as to what he actually and specifically did wrong. As a result, we've had to receive the sordid details through others, including a mistress that he met in 2007 who this week released a voice mail of Woods calling her to "cover his tracks." As bad as this will sound, global fame and fortune doesn't erase the fact that Woods is still just a male with sexual urges. Yes he's married, but men and women have been known to stray for obvious reasons as well as clandestine ones.
Tiger Woods is a human being.
As for the people that say he should never again be seen as a role model, I challenge them to look in the mirror and think back on their own mistakes and bad judgments. If firefighters and doctors have an indiscretion or two, does that erase the role model type good that they do everytime they save a person's life? Since we all know that humans are not infallible, why do we act as though the people that we idolize and canonize are perfect? From priests to schoolteachers, everyone has had their screw ups. So since Woods is being persecuted for his, shouldn't all of us get the same treatment? Just because he's a public figure, those rules don't change. Each one of us are "public figures" to our children and spouses and friends when we fail at being perfect so we should strip ourselves of any role model worthiness as well.
I'm just sayin'.
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