Olympic swimmer Ryan Lochte is the subject of a new reality show “that presents [him] as a professional public dummy.” Linda Holmes wonders if others will follow his example:
Ryan Lochte told The Hollywood Reporter this month that he has a role model, and her name is Kim Kardashian.
Now, this is in part a guy simply playing to his strengths. … But it’s hard not to wonder whether he’s also responding to what a giant drag it is to be a professional public hero when you can make just as much money being a dummy. When you’re a hero, your path is almost inevitably one that will at some point lead you to a mundane show of frailty that will be massively blown out of proportion until you offer a lame apology no one really believes you mean and many don’t believe you actually owe — and that’s if you’re lucky. If you’re not lucky, you’ll be doggedly followed until you really screw up, and then you get to do the full-on weepy apology tour while everyone blames you for the fact that kids don’t say “sir” and “ma’am” anymore. Why bother, right? Perhaps the people who would have been (rightly or wrongly) built up in order to be knocked down now realize that it’s just as easy to skip the rise and the fall and go straight to the reality show.
The Dish 