tuckova

Today I am thinking about public vs. private personality. In
particular, I am thinking about the difference between having a
voluntary or involuntary public persona, especially as it relates to
politics. How much we expect the families of politicians to step up and
work for them, campaign for them, smile endlessly and never even
scratch their noses. I think it’s unfair. I think it’s wrong. It is the
way it’s done, though, and I wish we could agree on some rules. I wish
for rules to protect the innocent, and I also wish for rules that will
make it possible for me to mock the ridiculous.

Though it seems unfair to me, I’ll concede that in order to
win, it is now necessary to haul your family along for the ride. You
can’t be a drug addict and your spouse can’t be either; also ideally
your kids will be reasonably respectable. Somewhere along the line we
started thinking the choices you made as a family member were the
choices you would make as the leader of a country, and while I think
that’s not accurate I understand it’s part of the mythos and okay: You
wanna be president, your family will have to be at your side. And they
will be judged for their behavior at your side. If you don’t like that,
you don’t get to be the boss of the country.

So: You’re a family member of a politician. You’re going to
be judged. I don’t think it’s fair to judge anybody for their personal
appearance unless they’re trading on that appearance or have altered
that appearance. Plastic surgery is always fair game. The big nose you
inherited from your grandfather is not. Tattoos can be mocked. Acne
cannot. Bad makeup, bad perm, bad haircolor, ill-fitting clothes, and
the inability to walk in high heels for any person who is both old
enough to know better and financially capable of rectifying errors? I
have made those mistakes and so half the time I’m laughing with, but
make no mistake: I’m laughing. But it is not fair to mock without
sympathy the cluelessly young, honestly poor, or hopelessly
ill-advised, and it is never okay to assume that appearance (the one
you’re born with, at least) is any reflection of character.

But you can judge people for their behavior, for sure. Any
family member over the age of let’s say 16 should show up, unless they
have the flu or homework. They should look happy to be there. This is
not because they have to actually be happy but because if a family
member is in politics, I expect that member to have good enough manners
to handle a peace summit and I expect the rest of the family to be able
to muster the manners to smile through a a political convention. It is
not harder than telling Aunt Agatha you love that handmade sweater, and
if you don’t have the stamina for that, your family will not survive in
politics.

I
also think if they volunteer to go beyond standing at your side and
smiling and waving, if they, say, want to start their own blog in which
their description of themselves includes their astrological sign…
well, that’s like shooting Playmates in a barrel, isn’t it? And people
who fall asleep in church while trying to make their spouse look
attentive to an issue deserve at the very least to be openly laughed
at, even if they didn’t actually drool or anything.
I’ve yet to find anything funny in dog torture or glocks on a plane,
but I’m sure it will come to me. And it’s fair game, don’t you think?