In the United States, exploiting your mistakes is the quickest way to get rich. Spill hot coffee on your lap, and you're a multimillionaire. Eat too much or smoke too much, and wipe away your sorrows with some settlement money. Surely, no one appreciates this American device more than the bane of the The New York Times, Jayson Blair. He made a short career out of plagiarism, from being an admitted liar and a cheat. He has undermined the formerly stalwart reputation of arguably the best newspaper in the country, and of course, someone is willing to cut him a fat check to hear what he has to say. From this sorry deal we can take away one sad lesson: The truth doesn't matter.
We may have known this all along. We all have our opinions on the O.J. Simpson trial, on that persnickety Michael Moore character's camera angles and on whichever celebrity is getting away with something this week. We shrug it off and say, "Well, it's not fair, but it doesn't affect me."
But the new twist in the Jayson Blair saga is different. His falsified reporting did affect us. He is not notable for anything other than being a good liar. The fact that he will become rich by this talent alone is a milestone in the moral recess of this country.
The publishing company handling Blair's book, New Millenium Press, is already involved in disputes with Stephen Hawking and Michael Baldacci over credibility. A disreputable publisher is putting out a liar's book and labeling it "nonfiction."
First of all, few will buy this book. It will end up in 12,000 libraries and some bargain bins. Tabloid readers are currently nursing their sympathy pangs over J-Lo's recent heartbreak, and it will be months before they feel up to doting over something else. Businesspeople and soccer parents across the country all read the Blair story in Newsweek when the scandal was hot, and they've moved on. Journalists everywhere just shudder at his name and think, "lesson learned."
We don't want to hear why he lied. We know why people lie: for acceptance, for money, to make their lives seem exciting, to cover up shameful secrets. I can't think of a new way for Blair to spin this haggard topic. It's the stuff of daytime television, of B-movie scripts.
Furthermore, this dangles a world of possibility in front of the lazy and unscrupulous in our society. It's a crystal clear message: You can get away with it. You can screw hardworking people and reputable companies into thinking you are worth their time and money, and in the end, you will make out like a bandit.
But we see enough people publicly screw up their lives that it isn't fascinating anymore. It's not worth paying for. It is wholly depressing to think that we now go so far as to grant celebrity and a paycheck to anyone who has managed to commit a unique crime. A collective decision on the part of our culture not to buy into personal failures such as Blair's book strikes me as a wild idea, but I doubt it's American enough to catch on.
If I were commissioned to rewrite Blair's story, I'd have it end quietly. He'd find a job in a line of work where honesty is not requisite - perhaps driving an ice cream truck or shoveling snow, and he'd get by all right. No fanfare, no weepy memoirs and, certainly, no money to soften the blow.
Emily Lyons is a journalism senior. Reach her at emily.lyons@asu.edu.
