What Happened to Personal Discretion?

It’s official; the art of personal discretion is dead. Face it, we now live in a popular culture where anything goes and everything is ripe for public display. Take a look at almost any reality TV program and you often see young, attractive people degrading themselves on national television in pursuit of a monetary prize or ephemeral fame.

Contestants have been shown engaging in sexually crude behavior, distastefully exposing intimate body parts, using coarse language, speaking disparagingly and disrespectfully about fellow competitors, and sometimes displaying an astounding lack of common sense and class. 

 The notion of exercising personal discretion is simply passé for a generation hooked on camera phones, computer cams, text messaging and other forms of instant communication that allow individuals to engage in graphic show and tells whenever the mood strikes.

A friend was shocked, appalled and dismayed when she heard about the antics of the New Jersey teenager  who was arrested and charged with possession of child pornography for posting sexually explicit images of herself on MySpace. My friend couldn’t fathom why a young person would even dare do such a thing, let alone think it was acceptable behavior. But what my friend so innocently failed to grasp was that today’s teenagers have grown up with the Internet and comfortably using social networking sites such as MySpace, Facebook and Twitter where putting aspects of one’s private life on public display is the norm. What’s a few nude images between friends, when they can so easily be uploaded at the click of a button? As only a passive user of Facebook myself, I am still amazed at the intimately personal things friends seem compelled to post online. What they want me to know versus what I feel I need to know is often at odds.

Personal discretion has eroded partly because the Internet offers an irresistible venue for freely engaging in narcissism and self-promotion. It provides free self-advertising for those seeking some distorted sense of frame and notoriety. By creating a Webpage or posting images of oneself online, one can escape the shadows of obscurity to become known a entity. It’s like having one’s own personal billboard for all to see.

There was a time when the fear of shame or humiliation used to be a sufficient inhibitor to inappropriate or distasteful public behavior. Take extramarital affairs, for instance. The mistress involved in an extramarital scandal was once a universally scorned figure. Public sympathies were always reserved for the aggrieved wife and the “other woman‘s” identity, if known, often remained discrete or received scant attention. Few women in such situations wanted to be known as the homewrecker who destroyed a marriage.

Today, mistresses have often become minor celebrities. Instead of hiding in the shadows, mistresses brazenly discuss their affairs in public - freely participating in the media spectacle. Rielle Hunter, former fling of presidential candidate John Edwards and mother of the disgraced politician’s love child, gave a tell-all interview to GQ magazine. And look at the parade of women involved in golf superstar Tiger Wood’s tawdry extramarital escapades. Many willingly came forward, seemingly unashamed of their actions, to discuss their sordid affairs in the press.

So where do we go from here? Can we as a society return to our once modest and discrete ways? Sadly, probably not. The ubiquity of the Internet, reality TV and talk shows (where people seem willing to blather on about everything) have essentially blurred -- or obliterated -- the lines between private and public. Leaving little to the imagination is the new norm. These highly public venues also fuel an instant-fame-obsessed mindset that doesn‘t appear to be leaving us any time soon.

When reality TV features everyday people who become household names, regardless of how boorishly or stupidly they behaved on-air, 15-minutes-of-fame seekers will abound, especially when show producers dangle million dollar carrots in their faces. Apparently, illusions of fame and fortune have won out over concerns about self-respect and decency.

Think about it: If the fear of public humiliation and embarrassment isn’t enough to tame crude, lewd and outrageous behavior, nothing will. Like I said, discretion is dead.