This week, the Editorial Board is taking a page out of Bill Maher’s book and issuing a “New Rule” of our own: Celebrities and politicians are no longer allowed to speak in public.
Yes, we realize this may cause a bit of trouble when it comes to interviews and the campaign trail, but this epidemic of foot-in-mouth syndrome cropping up in public figures is getting out of control.
John Mayer apologized Wednesday for the latest in a series of eye-roll-inspiring, groan-inducing word choices with “scandal” written all over them. In an interview with Playboy, Mayer joked about being widely accepted by the black community, using the N-word. Granted, we understood what he meant and the meaning was in no way racist, but everyone — except Mayer, clearly — knows the word is off limits.
But he’s not the only one (See: Dog the Bounty Hunter, Don Imus, Michael Richards, Mel Gibson, Paris Hilton). Every time we turn around, someone with a household name — lately Rush Limbaugh, Rahm Emanuel and Barack Obama — is formally apologizing to the Special Olympics CEO Tim Shriver and getting Sarah Palin’s panties in a twist.
To be fair though, the public could stand to take it down a notch. We get the glass house thing. After all, it’s not as though we haven’t had the occasional case of verbal diarrhea ourselves; we at the Alligator seem to have a gift for offending people.
All we ask is that next time someone in the public eye decides to use an inflammatory word or phrase, they consider just for a moment the implications. In retrospect (Mayer, Emanuel, Obama, Limbaugh, etc.), sometimes it’s best just to shut up.
