Phil Mushnick Comes Clean [SATIRE, READ AT YOUR OWN RISK, FICTION]

THIS IS SATIRE AND FICTION - Read the disclaimer first

DISCLAIMER AND UPDATE (4:59 PM, 10/16): The following is a work of satire and fiction. It is satirical in tone and intent and perspective. Phil Mushnick did not actually write this piece, which is a satirical synthesis of what he's saying. My piece uses literal quotes from Mushnick's column liberally. To repeat, the following piece is not actually Phil Mushnick talking, but a satirical interpretation of his column from the New York Post. The copyright footer has been removed and this disclaimer has been added to the bottom as well. 

I don't apologize to anyone for the following column, but I do *sincerely* apologize to Mushnick himself and anyone else for any misinterpretation on the question of whether this is satire and any ensuant pain. It's my job as a writer to be clearer and, on that count, I failed. That means earnestly owning the misinterpretations I cause through my writing, even though no misinterpretation was intended. Words have power and I clearly failed to honor that power. Thank you.

Hi, everyone! I'm Phil Mushnick, columnist over at the New York Post. I'm actually writing this from the hospital! I wrote this column about Adrian Peterson and it got a lot of hits! The hospital staff accidentally gave me sodium thiopental - the so-called "Truth Serum" - so while they resolve that I'm gonna write a follow-up to that column, because hits are the most important part of my paycheck and hence my life, to the exclusion of basic ethics! Anyway, I'm a straight-shooter, so I'll admit it: I left some things out of that piece. Politics, editorial guidance, whatever you want to call it. But my friend Alex from Pearls of Mystery was gracious enough to accept this major columnist's minor addendum to his own piece. Thanks, Alex! Right now I feel like nothing can stop this stream of opinions. So without further ado, it's:

Counterpoint: Being a great player does make Peterson a great guy... to write a column about!

We in the media — especially those working event broadcasts — have a horrible habit of blindly or wishfully reporting anything that suggests great achievers are fucked up like the rest of us: That they're terrible human beings that we can self-righteously feel superior to.

Among many others, we did it with Tiger Woods and Lance Armstrong. Last year, we began to do it with Adrian Peterson, before, and then after, he was selected the NFL’s MVP. With every big game — 2,037 running yards worth — the media bloated his profile: There runs Superman, a super guy, too.

“We talked with him after practice, and let me tell you this and that about Adrian Peterson.” “Adrian Peterson still finds time to do charity work in the Twin Cities area.” Blah, blah and blah. Good equals goodness. All of it we the media - myself, especially - have held in silence solely so that if the need arises we can reverse course immediately and excoriate him as having fallen unimaginably quickly.

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Thus it was unsurprising Peterson’s downside went ignored until the moment where it would be most newsworthy and generate hits to call attention to his flaws. In 2009, he was busted for driving 109 mph in a 55 mph zone. He dismissed that as no big deal, which was doubly disturbing — his older, full brother was killed by a reckless driver. But we ignored it because none of that is especially newsworthy compared to the hundreds of other stories that are more notable from day to day.

Last summer, Peterson was in a club when he and friends were informed that it was closing time, past 2 a.m. Apparently, Peterson and pals felt they would decide when it was time to close. The police report noted three cops were needed to subdue Peterson. He spent the rest of the night in jail, arrested for resisting arrest (a charge that was later dismissed). We ignored that because it sounds like a minor incident that wouldn't sell newspapers on its own or rise above the thousands of minor alcohol arrests across the country every week.

Of course, we all have to operate from are our own set of values, our personal sense of right from wrong. Perhaps, given current standards among NFL players — mostly college men, no less — Peterson qualifies as a man of good character.

Still, I’m stuck with what I’ve got. And it’s sickening the NFL’s latest MVP, hours after his son died — allegedly murdered — declared he was “ready to roll,” ready to play football. Sickening because if he hadn't played, I could have also called him a quitter, in addition to a petty criminal. And my job is to write the best column I can technically claim isn't totally fabricated and libelous. It's only a shame the truth isn't more inherently upsetting. Oh, well, add that to the ledger of shit Adrian Peterson did to make my life harder. Yes, I'm bitter.

And if my son were murdered? I’d be fighting for breath, my knees weak with grief, demanding to know why, who, how. Then, I suspect, I’d seethe with rage, swearing retribution. I even think I’d take off a day or two from work. Maybe a week. Of course, no one would question the time I'd take off because we all grieve differently and I'm lucky only to be a minor public figure that mainly subsists on insulting more important public figures. My time right after a serious tragedy is not so carefully monitored. But it's important to judge how others spend their time in the aftermath of tragedy to make sure they're living up to my expectations.

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The suspect in the beating murder of Peterson’s 2-year-old is the boyfriend of Peterson’s “baby mama” — now the casual, flippant, detestable and common buzz-phrase for absentee, wham-bam fatherhood. So I'm going to use that casual, flippant, detestable, and common buzz-phrase over and over for the rest of the column because it makes my point sound more damaging.

The accused, Joseph Patterson, previously was hit with domestic assault and abuse charges.

With his resources, how could Peterson, the NFL’s MVP, have allowed his son to remain in such an environment? Since my principal point is that goodness on the field shouldn't translate to goodness off the field, surely being a good player and a bad person shouldn't even enter into a discussion of morality, but I'm still going to subtly insinuate it's important to note that he's the NFL's MVP.

Did he not know, or not care? Or not care to know? Or not know to care? Aren't these the questions I'm paid to find out, or would that be too much to ask of a journalist? Peterson couldn’t have provided his son a better life, a longer life? If he didn't know about the kid, as I'm presumably asking right there at the beginning of the paragraph, does that make me a terrible person to insinuate he did? I'm not qualified to answer that, either. Because to be honest. I don't know, and I don't care. And I don't care to know. I know to care, but I still don't, because my audience and my editors do not hold me to a higher standard, and there is no such thing as bad publicity in an age as ephemeral and forgetful as this. I've learned to take the good publicity, ignore the bad publicity, and wait for each new day to give me new people to pretend to hate because it doesn't weigh heavy on your conscience to be a terrible person if you can just be selective enough with your memory and compassion. And, if I can ask enough questions, I can insinuate the worst possibility and still dodge any possibility of libel.

Money can’t buy love, but having signed a $96 million deal, he could not have provided his child — apparently his second from a “baby mama” — a safe home? I don't know, I'm sure he'd have a good response to that if I asked him. But the truth is, I don't want to get anywhere near him. Frankly, I'd rather lob rhetorical, race-baiting Molotov cocktails instead of dealing honestly and openly with social problems.

THIS IS SATIRE AND FICTION - Read the disclaimer first

And given Peterson’s father did hard time for drug money laundering maybe we’re both stuck with the values in which we were born, raised. Yes, I'm implying that Peterson knew all the facts of the situation, including the possibility of fatal assault, and refused to intervene. After all, his dad's a money-launderer! How can Adrian Peterson have any moral conscience? In fact, if you take my argument to its logical conclusion, you'll see that Adrian Peterson's son surely deserved to die because his father's such a bad guy and can't escape that shadow as long as he lives! Am I right? Ha ha! Anyway, the enormity of this situation is almost beyond my ability to give a hot sports take to. But, as you can see, I tried. Unlike Adrian Peterson. On Friday, Peterson said he was “focused” on football. On Sunday, he played. But it’s not as if murder doesn’t now regularly afflict the NFL. Maybe Peterson’s son is just one more stands-to-reason murder victim, just another child born to just another “baby mama,” one more kid who never had a shot, anyway. Maybe, by now, even if we can’t accept it, we can expect it. 

P.S. *cough* I'm strongly hinting that Adrian Peterson was alright with his son dying and that's why he played. Because it didn't matter to him, and murder doesn't affect football players. Murder is hunky-dory with them. They are alright with murder. Having children out of wedlock is exactly the same thing as allowing them to be murdered. 

You probably already figured that out, though. Just wanted to spell that out one last time.

DISCLAIMER AND UPDATE (4:59 PM, 10/16): The preceding was a work of satire and fiction. It was satirical in tone and intent and perspective. Phil Mushnick did not actually write this piece, which was a satirical synthesis of what he's saying. My piece used literal quotes from Mushnick's column liberally. To repeat, the preceding piece was not actually Phil Mushnick talking, but a satirical interpretation of his column from the New York Post. The copyright footer has been removed and this disclaimer has been added to the bottom as well. But since this is the bottom, you can probably see that yourself.

I don't apologize to anyone for the preceding column, but I do *sincerely* apologize to Mushnick himself and anyone else for any misinterpretation on the question of whether this column was satire and any ensuant pain. The words may not be real, but the pain from misinterpretation is still quite real. It's my job as a writer to be clearer and, on that count, I failed. That means earnestly owning the misinterpretations I cause through my writing, even though no misinterpretation was intended. Words have power and I clearly failed to honor that power. Thank you.

THIS IS SATIRE - Read the disclaimer first