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Welcome to Thinking Out Loud, a blog that contains postings from The Tampa Tribune’s Editorial Board and from various Tribune Community Columnists. Unlike the unsigned editorials that represent the newspaper’s institutional voice, the blog postings offer personal perspectives on the issues, personalities and events of Tampa Bay. We invite you to participate by posting your comments. We’ll do our best to respond.

Contributors:

Joe Guidry

Joe Guidry is the deputy editorial page editor of The Tampa Tribune. He is a Tampa native and a graduate of the University of South Florida. He is married and has an adult son.

Jeff Stidham

Jeff Stidham grew up and lives in Bartow. He has been with the Tribune for nearly 22 years, the last 10 on the editorial board.

William Yelverton

William Yelverton is a Tribune editorial writer who has worked for the paper nearly 22 years. He lives in the Dade City area.

Jim Beamguard

Jim Beamguard is a Tribune editorial writer. He is a native of North Carolina and a graduate of Davidson College. He and his family live in Brandon.

Jackie Papandrew:

Jackie Papandrew is a freelance writer and editor. Her syndicated humor column appears in publications in the United States, Canada and India. She lives in Largo with her husband and children. Visit her website at www.jackiepapandrew.com.

Camille Beredjick

Camille Beredjick is a senior at Chamberlain High School, an avid musician and a scribbler with a quirky sense of humor. In the fall, she will be attending Northwestern University to study journalism, political science and music, and she plans to pursue a career in journalism.

Jim Harnish

Jim Harnish is in his 17th year as Senior Pastor at Hyde Park United Methodist Church in Tampa. He and his wife, Marsha, have two daughters and two grandchildren. He is a graduate of Asbury Theological Seminary and received the honorary Doctor of Divinity degree from Bethune-Cookman University. He is the author of six books and numerous articles and studies. He enjoys playing with his grandchildren and cheering for the Florida Gators.

Angela Hunt

Angela Hunt is a novelist living in Pinellas County with her husband and two 220-pound mastiffs.

Sheryl Young

Sheryl Young was a Tampa Tribune Community Columnist in 2005-2006. A freelance writer since 1997, including the Tampa Bay Business Journal, Tampa Style Magazines, St. Pete Times and nationally in Better Nutrition, Today’s Christian Woman and more. She’s received a First Place Amy Foundation national "Roaring Lambs" Writing Award, and has lived in Tampa Bay with her family for over 20 years.

Christie Gold

Christie Gold teaches English and journalism at Freedom High School in Tampa where she advises Revolution, the school newspaper. She has been both the Hillsborough County Teacher of the Year and Florida Journalism Teacher of the Year. She lives on a small farm in Wesley Chapel where she trains as a competitive equestrian.

Natalie D. Preston

Natalie D. Preston is a karaoke singing, only-child pouting, Seminole Tomahawk waving, newlywed bride blushing, 50-state traveling, girlie girl who loves to shop, read, run and jump up and down on her soapbox.

Fernando Figueroa

Fernando Figueroa is a researcher, educator and lives in Riverview.

Gary Beemer

Interests include humor, politics, economics, community and world affairs, finance, people, religion, music, sports, current events, the arts and education.

Nicole Yunger Halpern

Nicole Yunger Halpern is an undergraduate at Dartmouth College, where she studies everything she can get her nerdy little hands on. Desired major: life. No, not necessarily biology. Life.

Kris DiGiovanni

Kris DiGiovanni is a Tribune Community Columnist, Huffington Post contributor, Daily Kos diarist, and teacher, who recently moved from NW Hillsborough to another planet - a small beach community in Pinellas County. She also blogs at www.sandscript.wordpress.com

H. David Braswell Jr.

H. David Braswell Jr. is an Information Systems Professional. He is a native New Yorker and a lifelong NY Giants fan. He attended college in California (Cal State Northridge) and moved to Tampa in 1998.

Sean Marcus

Sean Marcus teaches creative writing, journalism and reading at Chamberlain High School. He has one son and is expecting a daughter in early March. He can be reached at wuizabug@gmail.com

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Tiger Hunting: Sport or Assassination?

Posted Dec 2, 2009 by Kris DiGiovanni

Updated Dec 2, 2009 at 01:02 PM

I am so over all the Tiger media hysteria. I actually saw a headline today that read, “Is this the End of Tiger Woods?” Holy finch-on-a-stick, people, get a grip.

I haven’t seen such a frenzy over nothing in a long time. The “this is what really happened,” reports are probably right. It was a domestic dispute that spilled out onto a public street. Hell hath no fury, and all that.

But why do we “need” to know the gory details? What business is it of ours? Shame on the media for fanning the flames on this one. We need to just let Mr. Woods pay his fine and for the damages to public property, and try to resolve whatever issues there may be in his marriage – in private.

We need to stop being so nosy.

Not just about this, but about a lot of things. If you ask me, far too much of what passes for news these days is actually just an invasion of someone’s privacy. I’ve heard the rationalization that once a person accepts celebrity, the price they must pay is having their life open to public scrutiny. I disagree with that premise. Just because someone’s famous does not justify seeking out the most intimate details of their life and putting them on public display.

I have wondered, after seeing similar examples of private issues being made public, if society was becoming increasingly mannerless, or if our hunger for knowledge of other people’s lives is simply part of human nature. I’ve reluctantly concluded that it’s the latter.

Humans are by nature, just plain snoopy. As an amateur genealogist, I read lots of old newspapers. One of the main features of most local papers used to be a section reporting who in the area visited who, who traveled where, who was sick, and with what malady, etc. Lists of guests invited to private parties, details of the entertainment, the food served, and the gifts received were often printed. What one bought or sold, along with the price, might be published as well. Why? Because people back then wanted to know everyone else’s business.

Getting the gory details out is a time-honored media tradition. I have a newspaper article from the 1930’s that not only contains several grisly photos of a dead body, but brags “Fifty minutes after bullets blazed in R______, the [paper] was on the streets,” and goes on to boast of having once again successfully met the high standards to which its readers were accustomed. Things haven’t changed much since then. While today’s news organizations might not show the actual body, at least not without some parts of the image blocked out, they are still all engaged in the battle to get there first with the most shock value.

The Tiger Woods story is just the latest example of the public’s penchant for prying into the lives of others, and the media’s willingness to cater to that desire. If not for our collective curiosity about what’s happening to other people, there would be no tabloids, no reality shows, and no backups caused by looky-loos at accident scenes. The pervasivness of these things simply illustrates the fact that we all want to know what’s going on with other people.

On the whole, I think it’s ok to be interested in the aspects of another person’s life. If a person of celebrity willingly makes pubic certain details of his or her life, that’s fine by me. But there are limits that should be set. There are lines we shouldn’t be willing to cross. There are times when we and the media should just stop and say, “That’s really none of my business. Knowing this will not serve the public good, and may actually cause hurt or harm to the person involved.”

Maybe you disagree. But, try for a moment to put yourself in the place of Mr. or Mrs. Woods. How would you feel if it was your privacy we were all invading?

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