My latest essay for ANewDomain.net addresses something no one else in the media cares about: the violation of privacy rights represented by the Donald Sterling recording:
Private phone calls are not public statements.
Sterling’s record as a racist was there all along, available to anyone who cared to Google his name. Nothing new has emerged, nothing new is known because of Stiviano’s tape.
If people wanted to protest his racism, they could have, and should have.
Meanwhile, something very precious — the right to talk shit on the phone, even the right of a total jackass to talk shit to his ex-mistress on the phone, with the freedom that only comes with the assumption that only the two people on the call will ever listen to its contents — is in danger.
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3 Comments.
Good point, Ted.
Who did record that call?
People who object to all of this spying need to organize a regular telephone hour to to vent spleen, just curse, and say, “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore!”
And nude parades to protest the violations of privacy, and mass Public Piss demonstrations to protest the lack of public facilities.
There is not ONE public bathroom in the whole Chicago Transit Authority system. The parking lot smells like a zoo and the platforms get a regular hosing down between the more random hosings that our animal nature requires.
Ted,
Not too go on for too long about this, but first, you’re right: the guy’s privacy was violated. Second, a point raised by a co-worker: the guy’s 80. He could be losing his mind. (Given his track record, that doesn’t seem likely. Or, he’s been losing his mind for a long time.)
But we do, at least, skirt the issue of “didn’t you know better”? He’s on the phone with his mistress and …
Let’s back that up. A mistress. I don’t want to sound like a Puritan, but she’s his mistress. The Venn diagram of “mistress” and “gold digger” may not be a perfect overlap, but it’s probably pretty close. Didn’t he know better? Did he — hang on, I have to throw my head back and howl with laughter — think she actually LOVED him?
Oh, my. I will have to reconsider my co-worker’s theory. Clearly, the guy has lost his friggin’ marbles.
I read this morning that Sterling’s been ousted from the NBA. Given that they sometimes penalize players for their behavior off the court, it is in keeping with their policies. I, personally, don’t agree that the players’ or owners’ jobs include being role models, but that is the public perception.
I do agree w/ Ted on this one, she had no right to publicize their private conversations in the first place. OTOF, as I noted earlier, it’s hard to feel sorry for rich assholes.