Opinions
Don’t Apologize, Michael!
Michael Phelps’ apology for smoking pot was a lot like his personality: lifeless and rote.
Olympic champion and repentant pot smoker Michael Phelps at a press conference last week. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)After the British tabloid News of the World published a photo of record-breaking Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps smoking a marijuana pipe, Phelps maneuvered the subsequent apology circuit as deftly as he does the 400 meter individual medley.
“I engaged in behavior which was regrettable and demonstrated bad judgment,” he said in a statement released on Sunday. “I’m 23 years old, and despite the successes I have had in the pool, I acted in a youthful and inappropriate way, not in a manner that people have come to expect from me. For this, I am sorry. I promise my fans and the public—it will not happen again.”
I for one am absolutely appalled at Phelps’ behavior. He has set a terrible example for his young fans everywhere, one that could, in the long run, lead to ruined lives and squandered promise. By apologizing for smoking pot, Phelps did two things: He became the umpteenth athlete to legitimize our country’s bizarre, destructive war on pot, and he confirmed his status as one of the tooliest superstar athletes in recent memory.
Let’s face it: Phelps is pretty dislikable. Yes, he is an insanely gifted physical specimen, someone who, clichés and hyperbole notwithstanding, really does push the limits of what human beings are capable of. But he also lacks any personality or charisma whatsoever. You rarely come away from watching an interview with him saying—to borrow an unfortunate phrase from the political world—“Wow, I’d really like to have a beer with that kid.”
There’s a definite spectrum when it comes to superstar athletes and their personalities. Some sports stars are just great; others are great and become known not just for their athletic exploits, but for their outsized personalities. Charles Barkley is probably the paradigmatic example of the latter. Yes, he’s a hall-of-fame former professional basketball player, but he’s also a must-watch commentator because he has strong opinions and no compunctions about voicing them. Other athletes, though, are sterile, lifeless. The sense of joy that should permeate athletic greatness doesn’t shine through when they’re not competing. LeBron James is an example. Despite the advertising dollars and the branding efforts—“King James,” etcetera—James simply doesn’t come off as a naturally interesting, dynamic person. Nor does Phelps.
If Phelps wanted to rebuild a personality that has apparently been scrubbed away by too much chlorine, this would have been an excellent place to start. He could have called a press conference yesterday and said, “Look, I smoke weed sometimes. Who cares? It obviously hasn’t affected my performance or ruined my life like so many folks claim. I’m not going to apologize for an activity I—and many of my peers—enjoy, and which is safe when done in moderation.”
Instead, Phelps offered up an apology (posted on his Facebook page) that gets even more painful to read when it is closely parsed: “despite [his] successes” he smoked weed, acting in a “youthful” way. Right, because only unsuccessful, young people smoke weed. Everything about his statement is dishonest, unless you’re willing to believe that Phelps actually thinks smoking weed is “inappropriate” and is prepared to never do it again.
Phelps’ apology makes him come off as a complete stooge, as someone whose moral values stem entirely from his own value as a marketing asset. And the sniveling obsequiousness he displays has a price. Despite the fact that there are now several organizations dedicated to reforming marijuana laws in the United States, and despite some successes on the state level, our drug discourse still lags far behind reality. The inarguable fact that tens of millions of perfectly successful people use marijuana recreationally has yet to penetrate our shrilly hysterical anti-drug id and the thick crust of paranoia that surrounds it. Countless lives are ruined because of our inability to have an adult conversation about marijuana.
There are plenty of reasons for this—racism, the financial profitability of imprisoning millions on non-violent offenders, the political profitability of demonizing drug users—but another factor is the maddening degree to which high-profile athletes like Phelps immediately roll over when they are caught with a joint in their hands, sobbing apologies as they prostrate themselves before moral crusaders who have no idea what the hell they are talking about. Yesterday, Phelps showed that while he may have incredible physical gifts in the pool, there isn’t much more than meets the eye when it comes to who he is as a person.
Jesse Singal is an associate editor at Campus Progress.
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