Les Payne

December 17, 2009

That scarlet “A” on Tiger Wood’s chest was imprinted there by a media unforgiving of his adultery against the alabaster Swedish au pair the golfer dared take as his wife. These Puritans are determined also to remove the swoosh of endorsements from Woods’ cap and golf gear and have him walk the greens for the rest of his life in sackcloth.

Like Hester Prynne, of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “Scarlet Letter,” the condemned Tiger Woods must now walk to the scaffold of the pillory and face the judgment of the community, either on the shoulders of Oprah, or under the scold of Steve Kroft.

The 17th Century crime of Tiger Woods’, as noted on the web of pillory, has been clocked as serial and in double figures.

Such patterns unfortunately are not unknown among entertainers these days when backpedaling superstars routinely catch scores of willing groupies overnight. This normalization of Puritan misbehavior among film, music and sports celebrities appears to have caught unaware a media far gone in the peck and sniff.  

Unfolding 24/7 since Thanksgiving, the volume and breathlessness of the news coverage, so-called, presents Woods as the poster child of celebrity philandering—as well as its' creator. Viewed, say, from Mars, it would appear that, among superstars, nothing has happened to marital fidelity since Hawthorne wrote his Scarlet Letter novel in 1850 about an incident that reportedly occurred among Massachusetts Puritans of the 1600’s.

Woods has been measured against this very standard of Puritanism—and found wanting by a truly amazed media. They care not a whit about the general normalization of such bad behavior among celebrities in this specific case.

One well-known, veteran sports writer stated on national TV that Woods should be paid not a dime in endorsements, or even allowed to play golf until and unless he publicly declares his monogamous fidelity to his former, swim-suit modeling, blond, silicone-enhanced, traveling nanny from Sweden.

While Woods must take full blame for his discretions—as he has—the media in their madness might reconstruct details of the Thanksgiving night episode, consider the possibility of spousal assault, and report on the unraveling of the marriage with disinterestedness, measured dispatch and fairness all around.           

As a side-bar, the circumstances of Woods’ life as a golfing child prodigy may well have ill-prepared him for the domestic hearth as a 28-year old pro on tour. This golf circuit would exert enormous stress fractures on the marital survivability of any young couple.

It might lower the temperature and improve the tone and substance of the news coverage, so-called, if the media would take into clear-eyed account the bizarre pressure brought to bear upon the lives of celebrities such as Woods. They might also take a look at the backgrounds of prodigies who are pressed into sports as infants by domineering parents, usually fathers, who obsessively grind out their own ambitions through their off-spring.

Andre Agassi’s autobiography, “Open,” describes his “lost childhood” given over to his father’s crazed pursuit of championship tennis. Incubated in a “Lord of the Flies” Florida Academy under a “forehands” drill instructor, Agassi’s socialization was stunted just as surely as Father Earl sidetracked Tiger’s development in areas outside golf.

Starting in 7th grade, Agassi gave what little time he had off court to the zany distractions of his hedge-row Mohawk, black eyeliner and a gold earring. Post-adolescence, the tennis phenom labored for attention under the influence of high-octane liquor and dope smoking, then graduated to seek relaxation between tournaments as an active pyromaniac setting fires in hotel rooms.

Not exactly fit for marriage, the 9th grade drop-out—most such tennis players escape high school—took Brooke Shields as his first wife. On their very wedding day, America’s sweetheart doomed the marriage by coaxing her groom to wear lifts in his shoes so she could walk upright in heels. Losing his hair as the couple forsook each other, Aggassi wandered off from Brooke Shields under his extravagant hairpieces, losing matches and dropping crystal meth—all under the radar of the sporting media that’s hell-bent on holding Woods’ feet to the Puritan fires.

As for the prodigy-turned-golf-phenom, Tiger chose to go trysting after the tail of his lost childhood. Through fault of his own, he finds himself armpit deep in the dismal swamp of a five-year marriage with two children.

As his judgment went south, Woods’ taste ran to hostesses of the night, errant barmaids, roving-eyed, event planners, Vegas-type porn stars, and, yes, blond nannies and gold-digging models of skimp. While avoiding Agassi’s Mohawk, earrings and crystal meth, as far as we know, Tiger Woods morphed off-course into a frat-house, Cablinasian superstar jock whose social development got arrested somewhere around adolescence.

None of this excuses Woods’ errant behavior any more than his behavior justifies the media branding Tiger Woods across his celebrity chest with a 17th Century scarlet letter “A” —deep into the first decade of the 21st Century.