By now, Im sure that you all have heard about Tiger Woods, um, creative approach to marital fidelity. If you havent, Ill fill you in. Its recently come out that Woods, the greatest golfer of his generation (and arguably of all time), has entertained more than a few mistresses during his marriage to Swedish supermodel Elin Nordegren.

This makes him significantly less than a cool guy, and were I to ever meet Tiger Woods in a social situation, I would probably remark to whomever I was with, Oh, theres that guy who cheated on his wife a bunch times with a bunch of different women. Lets avoid him. What Tiger Woods did was wrong. However, what Woods did is also none of our business.

Despite the fact that Tiger Woods is a superstar athlete and a mega-celebrity, hes still a human being with some sort of right to privacy. If Woods were just a Buick salesman instead of the guy endorsing Buicks on TV, in all likelihood the media wouldnt be fixated on his indiscretions. Again, while the fact that hes a cheating sack of donuts is a moral crime that shouldnt go un-judged, this whole situation just seems, for lack of a better term, dark.

What do I mean by that? The reason that these allegations of infidelity are so shocking to the public is that Tiger Woods has always been looked upon by the public at large as a sort of golden idol who can do no wrong. However, it seems that Woods abused his fame in order to attract women. If Tiger can do something like this, whats to say that other celebrities dont do similar things?

If this is true, I dont want to know. If similar allegations come out about other celebrities, Im going to cover my ears and run around singing Christmas carols until the allegations have blown over, because I dont want my image of my heroes to be tarnished.

There have been countless public figures who have accomplished great things while living less-than-rosy private lives. This begs the question: How do we reconcile a persons public achievements with the bad that they may do outside of the limelight? Can we?

I just dont know.

In lighter news, I just got back into town, fresh from another arduous semester up in Chapel Hill. So if you see me around, say hi.~ Modern Age written by Drew Millard