Mark Morford thinks we have just gotten way too politically correct these days - everybody is apologizing for something...

Whatever I did, I'm sorry, I think

San Francisco Chronicle| Friday, December 15, 2006

I would like to apologize, right here and now, to the entire black community. And also, of course, the white community. And the Asian American community and the Jewish community and also the Poles and the Latinos and the Italians and, what the hell, the Scots and the Welsh and the Germans, too. After all, this is no time for bias.

See, I did indeed utter that terrible slur. At least, I think I did. I completely admit it. I'm sure I probably said it aloud, in a room full of people, loud enough for everyone to hear and for everyone to recoil in abject horror, or at least in mild yawning shrug -- which, if you think about it, is probably worse.

And even though I'm not exactly sure what I said and I have no idea whether I actually said it or even whether it was a slur at all and not, say, a luscious compliment on your beautiful eyes and soft hands, I do know it elicited some immediate gasps, a few groans, a handful of "Oh, my Gods" and even some hearty chortles from everyone within earshot -- but that might be because I didn't have any pants on. Plus, I was on fire. And screaming. Does that ring any bells? Were you there? I can't really remember. And I'm sorry for that, too.

The question is now asked of me: Do I feel any sort of deep regret for what I might have uttered? Do I feel any sort of awkward kinship with Mel "I (Heart) Jews" Gibson or Michael "What, Me, N-Word?" Richards, whom I shall henceforth refer to as my "homies in crime"? Check that: my "partners in niggardly deeds"? No, wait. Oh, my God, what did I just say? Oh, right. Look it up. Whew.

And the answer is, of course, no. In fact, so far, there has only been a happy silence about it all. No one is writing angry letters to me about it. No one is sending hate mail to The Chronicle, asking for my deranged head on a politically correct platter -- at least, no more than usual.

What's more, no one is calling from the Larry King show to interview me about my imploding career and my burgeoning heroin addiction and the fact that I totally forgot to wear underwear when I was stepping out of my Audi that night in front of Ikea and the paparazzi went absolutely crazy and my long-underappreciated crotch instantly appeared on roughly 10,000 blogs and you simply could not look away. (Please note: It's possible I made up most of that last part. But hey, a guy can dream, right?)

See, it's all too easy to make excuses. It's all too easy, for example, to say that the reason I was cruising the wrong way down the freeway at 4 a.m. in my big SUV was because, like Nicole Richie (5 feet, 1 inch, 85 pounds!), I had popped a couple of Vicodin and smoked some excellent pot and had so little body mass left that my shrunken brain simply thought the off-ramp was an on-ramp and, wow, there sure are a lot of people heading the wrong way on the L.A. freeway this morning -- oh wait, whoops!

See, I would never say that. Mostly because it wasn't Vicodin. It was absinthe. And I weigh at least 185. And I'd never own an SUV. I mean, please.

People ask if I'm traumatized by it all. If, like Mel and Mike and Nicole and Andy Dick and Janet Jackson and Ted Haggard and Britney's privates, I feel so much remorse for my actions that I'd like nothing more than to shrivel up and disappear into my giant pink bed/personal mountain of cash and then laugh like a hog in manure for a solid week until the feeling -- and the blog fascination -- passed.

The answer is, well, no. Not at all, really. In fact, I feel pretty damn good. I have entirely skipped right over calling Oprah to beg her to go on her show so I can weep openly as I describe how my mother spanked me every other day when I was a child with a strip of bright orange plastic Hot Wheels track until I wailed Jesus' name, which clearly is what turned me into the irrepressible demon I am today. Unless it was my beloved Rock 'Em Sock 'Em Robots. So violent! Man, those things will warp a kid good. But I digress.

I will even go a step further. I'm even willing to admit that I'm rather perversely proud of saying/doing/thinking/writing things that make some groups titter and other groups cringe and still others shrug and yawn and laugh and mock the president with abject glee. But again, that might just be the absinthe talking. Who can say?

So why apologize at all? Why add my voice to the dumb scraggle of celebs and wannabes and faded C-list stars who can't help but apologize for not being smart enough to do things and say things and be things they can be sufficiently proud of that they don't have to apologize in the first place?

Well, because I am here to help. I am merely offering up the energy of apology to a needful culture, a desperately undervalued universe. After all, if there's one thing we don't have quite enough of in the world, it's heartfelt apologies.

Maybe it's just something about our culture. Generally speaking, we don't like to apologize for, well, anything. And honestly, sometimes this seems like a very good thing indeed. After all, people are so damned sensitive, right? So amped up on the need to find things that infuriate them and upset their delicate sensibilities that not a day goes by where they can't find something that makes them want to rip out their eyeballs in appalled indignation and then write a letter/kill a flower/send a lock of hair to the authorities for DNA verification, just in case.

Then again, other times, it seems as if we can't apologize enough. This is the deep irony of it all. It seems like the things we should be apologizing for -- like, say, launching interminably brutal wars, choking the planet, gagging the human spirit via adhering to stiff and sexually panicky religious doctrines, thinking "The King of Queens" is actually a watchable program -- these things never get the hotly apologetic, repentant energy they deserve. You know?

It all results in this weirdly lopsided perspective, a sort of inverse apology vacuum wherein we celebrate and champion and revel in many of the exact wrong things, while apologizing for all sorts of inept and adorably silly things that no one really cares about and which we would all probably ignore completely if it wasn't all so damned silly and exhausting and, you know, karmically perverted. Wait, does that make any sense at all? No?

Sorry about that.

Note of disclaimer. Author(s) referenced above in no way have anything to do with this site nor the views expressed herein. The author(s) above have not contacted me about suing me. I'm sure s/he can sue me if s/he wants to (I'm not sure for what) but I would prefer that s/he didn't - so thanks for not.