Did Tiger Woods owe the public an apology?

[LoZoccolo]

Poll question: Did Tiger Woods owe the public an apology?

[Luminous Animal]

1. Hide thread.

[11 Bravo]

34. But don't forget to comment first.

:boring:

[Wapsie B]

2. No, this was a show with the purpose of getting sponsorship $$$ back.

[dipsydoodle]

5. I doubt that.

.

[KharmaTrain]

12. It's All About The Benjamins

He did the press conference under the watchful eye of the PGA...who have been losing millions since this scandal unfolded. They need Tiger to get the TV ratings that generate the corporate money that gives them the good life. This was about stopping the bleeding and opening the door for Tiger to get back onto the golf course. They know his return will send the ratings through the roof and they want a big payday.

[dipsydoodle]

19. Fat lot of good it did them then

given he didn't even commit to playing this year. Yes - the sport is losing huge bundles in his absense.

[KharmaTrain]

42. He Will...

This is the first step of his "rehabilitation". He'll spend the next couple weeks out of sight in some "sex rehab clinic" (I'd sure like to know what the 12-steps in that treatment covers) and then word will slip out that he'll be at the Masters or US Open...make his return later this year to big ratings. This is strictly a business move to stop the bleeding of sponsors.

[donheld]

37. -1

[City Lights]

40. Yup. nt

[Incitatus]

3. No, his personal life is no ones damn business.

[Joe the Liberal]

4. NO, who cares, celebrity gossip is NOT news. n/t

[MrModerate]

6. He's trying to rebuild his business. Are we owed an apology?

Does anyone care?

[eridani]

7. Jeebus. I could care less.

He should apologize to his wife and other members of his family. None of anybody else's business.

[Webster Green]

8. Couldn't care less what he does.

He's a fucking jerk, and golf is the most boring game ever. :smoke:

[ashling]

9. How many people enjoy a good train wreck?

[Radical Activist]

10. The press and public owe Tiger Woods an apology.

The press for being so obsessed with his personal life, and the public for allowing the press to continue.

[Raschel]

30. +1

[City Lights]

31. I don't owe him a thing. nt

[Frank Cannon]

11. He is quite possibly the most boring and useless man on Earth

And he excels at what is quite possibly the most boring and useless sport on Earth.

The only apology Tiger Woods owes me is for having his ugly, mannikin-like mug on the TV every time I turn it on.

[TheWatcher]

13. No, I think YOU owe everyone an apology for posting this INANE nonsense.

Isn't there an American Idol re-run you could be drooling in front of or something?

[AsahinaKimi]

14. I was stuck in a Dentist's office while this was on their TV..

Everyone waiting yawned..it was boring as Hell. It the first time was Eager to go to my Root Canal. Seriously!

[mmonk]

15. Nope.

Just his wife and family.

[old mark]

16. No vote - I don't care enough about his bad behavior. He owes his wife and kids

a lot, and I'm certain her lawyer will have a long list, but I personally am just very tired of seeing this bullshit on TV as if it were important. It is not.

mark

[Bitwit1234]

17. If the media as usual did not make a spectacle

out of it this would have fizzled out the next week and nothing would still be going on about it. Of course he is a role model. But if he wants to mess around with 1,000 women, the only one who should be apologized to his wife. And if she accepts the apology and takes him back, that should be the end of it. But the media is celebrity crazed. They are so fascinated by a public figure they mess their pants being near one. AND WHAT MAKES THE CELEBRITY MORE OF A 'THING' THAN THEY HAVE M-O-N-E-Y!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[TreasonousBastard]

18. Dunno about "the public" but he doesn't owe me shit.

[stray cat]

20. TIger did it for himself - Make amends is part of a 12-step program for addiction

[proudohioan]

21. Talking heads don't like their reflections in Tiger's mirror

No, Tiger didn't owe the public an apology, but now that he has given one, the talking heads don't like what they see. His apology was "too long," or his wife wasn't by his side, or he might lose his Nike contract. Horrors!

What Tiger did was stand up there, alone, and accept full responsibility for his own actions. More importantly, his apology was a frontal assault on his own narcissism, and by extension an attack on the narcissism of everyone, including that of the talking heads, and they HATE that. They don't want to face it, because to do so is to face themselves, and they don't like what they see.

Tiger said he did what he did because he felt entitled to do so, and he thought only of himself and his desires, leading to actions that caused suffering for both himself and everyone involved. In short, he spoke the truth in a profoundly honest, and Buddhist, way. He blamed no one and nothing else other than himself, for he realized that his mother's Buddhist teachings were true, and that the only way to start on the road to alleviating the suffering that he caused was to first admit to himself and everyone else that he and his decision to follow his desires was the sole cause of all that suffering.

All of the damned talking heads are narcissists to some degree, going on about how THEY feel or what THEY approve of or what THEY think the rest of us should think. Consciously or not, Tiger forced them to look at their own very flawed selves, and they felt uncomfortable.

Now the real Tiger-bashing will begin. They'll try to humiliate him, and to hit him in the pocketbook, just so they can feel superior to Tiger and continue their own self-justifying, narcissistic, attention-grabbing lives without having to admit to their own weaknesses.

[whattheidonot]

35. pr

This may be heartfelt but it is all part of the PR needed to return to playing. he will do tv shows, clinics etc. no way he can just start playing golf now.

[JerseygirlCT]

22. Not for his actions

But geez, for the media wallpaper, maybe. Enough, already. I put him with Palin and the Gosselins - I simply don't care to hear another word!

[rox63]

23. This was all about repairing his image

The only people he owes an apology to are his family and friends.

[jakefrep]

24. Absolutely not

The crisis management and image "experts" that have been all over TV the last 24 hours are flat-out wrong. It doesn't matter one goddamn bit what Tiger Woods says or does not say to the baying hyena media as long as he makes a good-faith effort to make amends with his family.

[mochajava666]

25. This is a case where a person is a corporation

The Eldrick "Tiger" Woods corporation had a press conference in order to start damage repair.

Eldrick as a person needs to apologize to his wife and a lot of people he lied to.

[Danger Mouse]

26. Not really. I mean, his behavior was disgraceful, but it doesn't matter to me in any way.

:shrug:

[City Lights]

27. I've never been an Eldrick fan, so we owe each other nothing. nt

[bikebloke]

28. If he was truly sorry...

He'd give me a portion of his millions so I could retire in New Zealand. Next week.

[kstewart33]

29. What apology?

That wasn't an apology. That was a well rehearsed, totally controlled con job to convince his sponsors not to drop him.

[donheld]

38. -1

[City Lights]

41. Indeed. nt

[TexasObserver]

32. No

[11 Bravo]

33. He didn't owe shit to anyone not named Woods or Nordegren.

And to those who are saying, "But he was a role model for my children" I say, "Raise your own fucking children".

[supernova]

36. No, I don't think he owed a public apology

in any moral sense.

However, two things are going on here:

1) I've come to understand that public absolution is part of recovery therapy. It's not that the listeners are owed so much as the person needs to express wrongdoing so that they can begin the healing process. I'm OK with that aspect of it. I would feel better if he had/will privately broken it off with his "mistresses." In the age of equality, can we please stop using that archaic term? They aren't "mistresses" who will be alternate wives throughout his life. They're casual hookups where both parties knew what they were getting into.

2) His sponsors want the $$ to keep rolling in. This presser is PR. He is a business icon. For that aspect of it, I do feel sorry him. Most of us are left to attend to our screwups in private. I would wish the same for him. But that isn't going to be possible as long as they lead him around by the nose. He might learn to tell those folks to take a hike. He probably has enough money now to buy every PGA professional course in the US many times over. He should go with that. If he's the man I think he is (will become?) then he will eventually take this road.

[NoGOPZone]

39. Do you owe us an apology for posting another Tiger Woods thread?

The answers to both questions are the same.