Less than a week after reports hit of the Heisman trust closing its investigation into Reggie Bush’s improper conduct while at USC, Bush decided to voluntarily forfeit his trophy. While the award was expected to be stripped from Bush and USC by the end of the month, Bush wanted to maintain the “legacy” and “good name” of the coveted award.
Wouldn’t that have been better accomplished by not taking the assortment of cash, a car, a house, hotel stays and other big benefits in the first place? Sure, I’ll admit that I respect his decision to not drag this situation completely through the mud, but I won’t feel sorry for his loss in reputation.
That being said, I do actually think he’s sorry for what went down. Along with apologizing and returning the award, Bush said that he wants to work with the Heisman trustees to develop a educational sportsmanship program to help “student-athletes and their families avoid some of the mistakes that I made.”
A meat dress, really? If you missed the VMA’s this past Sunday, then you also missed the fabulously frightening outfits of Lady Gaga — an artist who can’t seem to stay in one dress an entire evening. She ranged from skimpy to hulking to almost immovable, but her final piece, a dress completely made up of raw slabs of meat, was quite possibly the most disturbing.
First, ewww. How could that have been comfortable and what about the poor noses of those around her?
Second, what an absolute waste. Though her dress message didn’t have anything to do with vegetarianism, I bet she ticked a couple hundred veggies off. In an interview with Ellen DeGeneres, who ironically happens to be a vegan, Lady Gaga explained that she had the dress made to protest the military’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy.
“It is a devastation to me that I know my fans who are gay … feel like they have governmental oppression on them,” Gaga said. “That’s actually why I wore the meat tonight.”
A picture surfaced a few days later, showing that, once removed, Gaga’s meat attire was left over night hanging on a chair. She wasn’t just happy with the smell of rotting meat on her own flesh. She had to adorn her surroundings with it too.
It’s her style to make bold statements and to be totally weird, but there seems to be a line somewhere that she said goodbye to a long time ago.
Mexican sports reporter Ines Sainz, claimed she felt sexually harassed by members of the New York Jets last Saturday while she was at a team practice and afterwards conducting locker room interviews. The TV Azteca reporter said that the players were throwing long passes near her, cat calling, whistling and openly checking her out.
“I die of embarrassment!” Sainz posted in Spanish on her Twitter. She has since received and accepted an apology from the Jets’ owner, Woody Johnson, but that’s unfortunately not where that media circus ended. Critics questioned Sainz’s own conduct and the way she presents herself.
Now, I don’t like to say that women “ask for what they get” by wearing or doing certain things, but when women are in a professional field, no matter what that field may be, there should be a sense of modesty, self-awareness and plain common sense. Did she deserve to be treated like that? No, absolutely not.
However, a person, especially a woman, has to put a little bit of perspective into presenting one’s self in a situation like that, wearing tight skinny jeans and an incredibly low-cut shirt exposing pretty much everything.
On the Today Show, Sainz commented that, “I’m not trying to provoke anything. I don’t think I need to change. They are going to change.”
That definitely helped the turn of events – I’m going to be strong, independent and my own unique woman, but change everything you do so that you don’t hurt my feelings. On the flip side, how is that fair?
I strongly believe that if a woman wants to be taken seriously within a predominantly male field, she must show that she’s not a dainty little girl fixated on what she looks like. That’s not to say, however, that women professionals need to banish their entire sense of femininity, but there is and must be a happy medium.
Debra Flax is a junior majoring in journalism. Her column runs on Thursdays.
