Can Everybody Please Lay Off Darva Conger?

Reader Response from The Fray:


I think that Darva is doing the "right thing." (I am not speaking to morality, just strategy) According to her, she tried to go back to her old job, but she was discharged due to paparazzi, etc. What is a girl to do? Over-expose yourself! Pose for Playboy and go on every talk show on the air. Let the media and the public chew on you til there is nothing left. The people will eventually lose interest (like Jessica Hahn or Kato). The only difference is, when it is all over, and the media wants nothing more to do with her, Darva can go back to her regular life in the ER, only she'll have a mil or so in the bank. At least I hope that's her strategy. I would despair for her if when the frenzy dies down, she appears as the host in a commercial for a psychic chat line-then we will all know she has really lost all dignity.

--Robin Myers

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A very insightful essay, but I have another point to add. Don't you think that a lot of the voyeurism that's rampant in the U.S. is for the simple fact that most of us just lead boring lives? I mean the only excitement we get is watching pornos and these types of sitcoms. If we had rich and fulfilling lives then the networks and movies and the tv would not be raking in the cash by the barrelfull.

--Randy

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I think one of the main reasons why people are critical of Darva Conger is that initially she made the rounds of all the talkshows talking about what a virtuous and traditional-family-values type of person she was, and how shocked she was by the fact that people were critical of her morals for going on the show. Now, after supposedly just wanting to go back to her previous normal, anonymous, straight-outta-Mayberry life, she's going to display herself naked in Playboy for some cash.

Had she been honest about her ambitions and intentions from day one, people would have been far less critical, and might even have seen her as kind of a lovable rascal. But that's not the way she played it, so naturally, people are critical of her for being at best a hypocrite and celebrity hound.

--Mark

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Boil this down to simpler elements, and the questions become even more basic. Watch any talking head interviewing a jock or guy in the street, and there are the traditional idiots aping for the camera in the background. People act like they've never seen the camera before. To add to that, people act like infants looking into a mirror for the first time. It tells me that any live camera offers an instant opportunity to step outside the prison of the self that each of us slowly builds over the course of life, in favor of a new self which is accepted merely by existing inside a TV screen. TV gives a false sense of intimacy which the viewer buys on sight. This illusion of intimacy drives insecure exhibitionists to sell out their privacy, dignity and personal worth for the thrill of unearned fame and the rewards it can bring. The more pathetic creature is the one who sits quietly in the dark, living vicariously through this hollow attempt to feel something without effort or risk. The Survivors are in it for a cool million. What the hell do we get out of it?

--T.J.Norton

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Darva's not hypocritical--we are. Who are all of us kidding? Given the opportunity to make nearly a half million dollars for the same amount of effort most of us would. Maybe we wouldn't pose nude. Maybe it would be telling some half-truths in our job to land that big account. Or perhaps it would be some other legal but shadowy way but most of us would grab that golden ring even if it meant stepping on a few toes to get it. I say good for Darva, I hope she improves her and her family's life. If I met her I'd shake her hand--this woman has outsmarted a lot of folks.

--RDJ

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