Bigger Fish to Fry

I feel bad for Manti Te’o. I don’t know the whole story. And perhaps never will. But it seems like when the media latches onto something they keep digging until they get what they want. As far as I’m concerned, Manti is the victim of a cruel hoax. Until proven otherwise. I don’t find it too hard to believe that a young 21-year-old --or however old he is –is gullible and naïve. I want to believe Manti. I watched him all season at Notre Dame. He seems like a nice young man. Yet the media seems to have turned on him and are now going after his jugular. Even if it does come out that Manti was in on the hoax, which I don’t think it will – but in this day and age nothing really surprises me anymore, is it really worth the amount of press it’s been getting?

What I find quite strange about this whole media frenzy is that there are so many more newsworthy stories right now in sports. For example, the whole Lance Armstrong scandal. Apparently he finally came clean and admitted to using performance-enhancing drugs. Which to me, was obvious from the get go. There is no way that one person can dominate a sport for so long without cheating. But that’s a whole other story.

It’s interesting that Pres. Uchtdorf, in his most recent CES fireside address this past Sunday, talked about truth. One thing I took away from that talk is that our perception of truth and reality can be totally different. For instance, e-mail forwards that seem to be running rampant, are full of stories that claim to be true, but are not. Even if you try to do your research to check out the truthfulness, those sources may also be false. In fact, I automatically assume that e-mail forwards are false. Most of them I don’t even take the time to read.

Another example is science. The truths taught in science are always changing. One example: when I was in school Pluto was a planet. Now it’s not.

The truth doesn’t really change, just our perception of the truth changes. Anyway, I found it interesting and probably not coincidental that Pres. Uchtdorf’s talk was all about truth. In the same week there are two big stories in the news concerning truth.

Another thing that is bothersome about this whole Manti Te’o feeding frenzy is that several articles I’ve read have stated that because Manti is a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of latter-day Saints, that the church will be scarred. And also that Notre Dame will be scarred. How does being the victim of a hoax, a cruel hoax, scar the church you belong to or the university you attended? Even in the worst-case scenario – Manti being involved in the hoax – there seems to be a lot worse crimes/sins out there than making up your girlfriend. Such as using performance-enhancing drugs to win seven Tour de France titles and lying about it for years and chastising those who told the truth about what you did. And finally coming clean after years and years of lying about it only because you were caught and there was no getting around the truth.

I wish the press would leave Manti Te’o alone and let him work through his pain and learn from this challenge and move on. There are bigger fish to fry.

That’s my two cents.