I have never understood why so many media members adore Brett Favre. I understand that he was a great quarterback, and I have written about that. There is a difference between analyzing a player's accomplishments, and gushing over him like he is a hero, role model, and wonderful person.
Brett Favre repaid $1.1 million in ill-gotten gains from Mississippi welfare funds--though he has yet to repay the $228,000 interest due from having those funds at his disposal--but recent reports indicate that his criminal culpability may well extend beyond that: a series of text messages between Favre and then-Mississippi Governor Phil Bryant suggest that Bryant helped Favre to cover up massive welfare fraud.
The media displays great interest in some cases of sexual misconduct/misogyny, but Favre's repeated failures in those areas are glossed over. Google the name Jenn Sterger if you are interested in the details--and you can look up Favre's behavior with massage therapists as well, because that is not difficult to find. It would not be true to say that Favre's misconduct has been ignored--as I indicated, you can find the details online--but the point is that his misconduct has not permanently stained his reputation. He is a media member himself now, and he is generally spoken of in reverential terms.
Skip Bayless loves to call Terrell Owens "Team Obliterator," but Favre is the real team obliterator. As I wrote after Owens was belatedly inducted in the Pro Football Hall of Fame:
Owens' journey from deprivation and hardship to the Pro Football Hall of Fame is inspirational. I would rather have a guy who says "Who can make a play? I can!" and then does it, as opposed to a "gunslinger" who is going to sling interceptions with everything on the line. Favre was a great player and a deserving Hall of Famer in his own right but the media's hagiographic treatment of Favre while constantly belittling Owens shines a disconcerting light on how much personal bias influences the stories that are fed to us on air, in print and online.
I previously analyzed some of the disinformation techniques used by various media members against Owens specifically and also in other situations. Media members demonize Owens and others who they do not like, but they lionize Favre and others who they like.
The reality is that Favre is a criminal, a creep, and a bad teammate, but many media members ignore those aspects of the Brett Favre story. The ongoing investigation into the extent of Favre's involvement in the multi-million dollar welfare fraud case is treated as an afterthought, not as a headline-worthy story.
Charles Robinson is one of the few media members who is not driving or even riding the Favre hype train:
Lest we forget, in the final weeks of his career, the NFL said Favre failed to fully cooperate with a league investigation into whether he sent former New York Jets employee Jenn Sterger multiple unsolicited photos of his penis while both were with the team in 2008. The NFL fined Favre $50,000 in the wake of that investigation in 2010. Sterger certainly hasn’t forgotten, commenting on Favre’s latest issues Tuesday with a series of tweets, including: “Oh.. NOWWWWW he gets in trouble for inappropriate texts.”
Then there was the 2013 civil settlement over a lawsuit brought by two massage therapists in response to allegedly sexually suggestive text messages Favre sent while with the Jets in 2008. Or the questionable business dealings, one involving litigation over bankrupt digital sports media company Sqor (which was ultimately thrown out, but not until after Favre had been named as one of the defendants in a fraud lawsuit brought by an investor); and in another case, a U.S. Justice Department investigation of Rx Pro, a brand that Favre heavily endorsed that later came under scrutiny for statements made about pain-relieving creams that hadn’t been approved by the FDA.
Robinson quotes Jeff Pearlman, Favre's biographer and one of the Favre hagiographers, stating that he now feels like no one should read his Favre biography. That is probably the only Pearlman statement that I will ever agree with, because--as I indicated in my review of Pearlman's awful Walter Payton biography--no one should read anything that Pearlman writes.
Like anyone, Favre is innocent until proven guilty regarding the as-yet unproven portions of the welfare fraud case--but it is a fact that he paid back over $1 million that he was not entitled to receive, it is a fact that he has yet to pay back the interest, and it is a fact that his name has been linked to the larger investigation. Those facts are newsworthy, and those facts deserve much more coverage than they have been given.
It is overly simplistic to assume that the disparities in media coverage are just based on race. Ray Lewis is a Black ex-NFL player who obstructed justice in an unsolved double murder for which he was a prime suspect and media members slobber over him shamelessly. I am not saying that race plays no part in poor media coverage; I suspect that racism is part of this particular problem, but that the larger problem has to do with a toxic mixture of money, popularity, charisma, and various personal/group agendas that shape not only how news is delivered but what news is discussed versus what news is buried.
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