OWN Oprah and Lance-spoilers (Read 328 times)

skygazer


    For some reason I don't have the outrage that everyone else seems to have.  I don't hate him.  I'm sad but not disgusted.  I suspect maybe I'm flawed, too.   I don't really care If I am.  I've made it this far.

     

    Steve Jobs would have cheated in the Tour de France.

    I don't hate LA. Why would I hate him?

    I'm not sad. Why would I be sad?

    I'm sure very few people, if any, in the world are flawless. That's not even a point to debate. It is the degree of flaw that's the point. I don't understand how some people don't seem to get that 10% (somewhat flawed) and 90% (severely flawed) are very far apart, and that 90% is not as close to 0% as 10% is.

     

     

    I'm curious that why you think Steve Jobs would have cheated in the Tour de France? I thought Apple has been trying to keep the playing field clean (for their advantage and because they do(did) have advantage over other companies) by bringing to the court any company that is trying to cheat.


    Why is it sideways?

        Nope. You don't know cycling.

        Ricky

        —our ability to perform up to our physiological potential in a race is determined by whether or not we truly psychologically believe that what we are attempting is realistic. Anton Krupicka

          "Did you feel you were cheating?" - OW

          "No.  I looked up the definition of cheating at it said 'to gain an advantage'"/ - LA

           

          Why would someone need to work so hard to destroy the lives of others, and cover their tracks, if they really felt their activities were legitimate?

           

          Ok, I shouldn't really comment because I can't watch OWN here in Germany, but I just want to say that the above LA quote ("looked up the definition of cheating") literally made me snort coffee out my nose. Yes, I am so sure he had total moral compunction about his actions until the dictionary assured him it was ok. I just can't with this guy. He needs to go the $%^# away already.

            I don't have the outrage, either. Maybe I would if I had been one of the persons directly affected.

             

            The part I don't get is that while watching CNN and looking at comments on cycling sites is that some people keep saying he's not sorry or remorseful.  My response is:  Who cares?  I just want the facts about what he did. I don't really care if he's sorry about it.

            I don't know how people would have come away from that interview thinking he's not sorry or remorseful.

            I believe he has said what needed to be said and i got the impression that he realizes that this is the first step on a long road to recovery and acceptance.

             

            The biggest problem I had with the interview was tHat I didn't get to bed at my usual 9:00 and it made it hard to wake up at 4:00 this morning.  I don't know that I'll be able to forgive him for that come 3:00pm this afternoon.

            cheers,

            Life Goals:

            #1: Do what I can do

            #2: Enjoy life

             

             

              I don't know how people would have come away from that interview thinking he's not sorry or remorseful.

              I believe he has said what needed to be said and i got the impression that he realizes that this is the first step on a long road to recovery and acceptance.

               

               

               

                  The biggest thing for me is not the fact that he cheated.  Hell, seems that it is nearly impossible to tell who was cheating in the tour, and there were a bunch of people who cheated, but just never got caught.  The whole situation with the entire tour in those years is tainted across the board.

               

                  So it is not the cheating that outrages me in particular, it is the fact that he SMASHED anyone around him for years that accused him of cheating.   Lance and his lawyers sued many people!  He sued people that were telling the truth about him, and made their lives miserable!  Take his female massage therapist as only one example of that.  He sued her, belittled her, affected her life in a very negative way, along with many others.  

               

                 I don't care if he came clean or not now.  It doesn't excuse the fact of all the damage he did for years to people who were telling the truth.  The lawyers are going to sue his ass off in several different cases and he is likely going to be one broke person soon.  He had it coming to him, and what goes around is now "coming home to roost" as it were.

              .

              The Plan '15 →   ///    "Run Hard, Live Easy."   ∞


              Feeling the growl again

                Lance is a flawed, ruthless person.  Those of us who knew him when he was young have known this a long time.  He would do whatever it took.   I am sick about all this, but I still support Lance in whatever he does going forward.  I'm sorry for the people he steamrolled.  I am not surprised.  I get it.  I guess I'm a bad person, but I DO get it.   I admire Lance for many reasons and I'm sorry he did some of the things he did. I believe he is, too.

                 

                Let's set aside the whole doping-and-cheating-in-a-sport-where-most-people-do-and-lying-about-it-to-the-bitter-end issue.  LA deliberately ruined peoples' lives to meet his own ends.  He ruined their reputations, ended their careers, and used his money and lawyers to sue them into financial submission.  A maybe or maybe not legitimate confession (and I did not stay up long enough to hear if there was an apology to these people) hardly makes up for that.  At least for me this is where some outrage does come from -- I believed in and supported this person, now I find out that not only was it all a fraud, but I fell for some of these games and thought less of some people who were really telling the truth, and they paid dearly for it.  "I'm sorry" is kind of laughable when it comes from someone living in a multimillion dollar mansion bought with their ill-gotten gains while those being apologized to are still trying to put their lives back together.

                 

                Nothing personal...really, I mean that... but I don't see what there is to admire here.  I know it's different when you know someone personally and for a long time but I'm left with the feeling that if Lance was my cousin I'd "accidentally" erase his address from my Christmas card list.

                "If you want to be a bad a$s, then do what a bad a$s does.  There's your pep talk for today.  Go Run." -- Slo_Hand

                 

                I am spaniel - Crusher of Treadmills

                 

                flarunner


                   

                  Let's set aside the whole doping-and-cheating-in-a-sport-where-most-people-do-and-lying-about-it-to-the-bitter-end issue.  LA deliberately ruined peoples' lives to meet his own ends.  He ruined their reputations, ended their careers, and used his money and lawyers to sue them into financial submission.  A maybe or maybe not legitimate confession (and I did not stay up long enough to hear if there was an apology to these people) hardly makes up for that.  At least for me this is where some outrage does come from -- I believed in and supported this person, now I find out that not only was it all a fraud, but I fell for some of these games and thought less of some people who were really telling the truth, and they paid dearly for it.  "I'm sorry" is kind of laughable when it comes from someone living in a multimillion dollar mansion bought with their ill-gotten gains while those being apologized to are still trying to put their lives back together.

                   

                  Nothing personal...really, I mean that... but I don't see what there is to admire here.  I know it's different when you know someone personally and for a long time but I'm left with the feeling that if Lance was my cousin I'd "accidentally" erase his address from my Christmas card list.

                   

                  As to your underlined above:

                  "I have good lawyers and a lot of money, I will destroy you" LA to Stephen Swart

                  Christophe Bassons had to quit his career as a professional cyclist.

                  Frankie Andreau was kept from getting jobs in cycling.

                  Emma O'Reilly no longer works in cycling.

                  And Micheal Anderson moved out of the country to NZ. (You really should read that deposition.)

                  Purdey


                  Self anointed title

                     

                    but I don't see what there is to admire here.  

                     

                    I agree.  He has hurt too many people.  He appears to have used his struggle against cancer to shield his illegal activity (I find this totally despicable),

                     

                    At least we now know for sure that it wasn't "all about the bike".

                     

                    And I guess that he has, at last, shown that he has the ball to admit to it.

                     

                     

                    xhristopher


                      How much money did this douchebag earn for this interview?

                        I don't know how people would have come away from that interview thinking he's not sorry or remorseful.

                        cheers,

                         

                        How does the saying go: Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me a million times over 15 years, shame on me?  Something like that.

                         

                        For starters he's a proven liar who's used false emotion to deceive people for over 15 years whenever he has stood to gain personally. He seems more desperate than remorseful to me, but hey, maybe the truth will set him free.

                        Runners run

                        xhristopher


                          Lance does what's best for Lance. Probably the most remorseful thing I heard was how he wishes he had handled the situation better earlier to potentially be in less trouble now. The person he feels most sorry for is himself.

                           

                          We know the story already so many of his lies last night were transparent. I don't believe for a second that he hasn't read Tyler's book. He's obsessed with himself. How could he not?

                          HermosaBoy


                            Not a fan of THE Lance for a multitude of reasons, but the fact that he doped isn't one of them.

                             

                            Bottom line -- he is a FREAK of nature with a ridiculous aerobic engine.  Would he have ever won the Tour without doping?  Who knows?  I would venture that more were doing some form of doping than were not (maybe I am jaded).  Does that justify his doing it?  I will leave that to others to debate.

                             

                            So, he admitted he doped -- alright, duly noted.

                             

                            Nothing else to see...

                            And you can quote me as saying I was mis-quoted. Groucho Marx

                             

                            Rob

                            BeeRunB


                              Lance Armstrong is not coming clean; he's using the interview to get something he wants. It's a calculated move to improve his public persona and change perception.

                               

                              These type of confessional shows seem to be true, but always have a ring of falsehood. Take Tiger Woods and his big public apology for cheating on his wife. As far as I was concerned, what went on between him and his wife was their business. Getting up and apologizing to the world was so false I wanted to vomit (I didn't, instead I had some almond butter and banana). It wasn't about being contrite, it was about controlling public persona.

                               

                              Same with Oprah's interview with Marion Jones.  Jones has one of those smiles that can melt your heart. In that interview, she spun it in such a way where the only wrong thing she did was to not tell the truth when the Feds deposed her about Balco, and that she hung with the wrong people. She smiled a lot and gave us that winning personality, and if a viewer wasn't careful, they'd be entranced by the show, and not really look at the truth of what they were seeing and hearing. John Singleton's 30/30 film for ESPN, "Marin Jones: Press Pause" was also an example of this same kind of spin. The film wanted me to believe that Jones made one poor decision: not taking a moment to think and listen to her lawyer before lying to the Feds. When the film was over, I felt good about the "main character" in the film (Jones). Then I did some research and realized that she went to jail for more than that. She was also indicted for a check fraud scheme. That was left out of the film. These manufactured events (interviews and film) have the intent only to change opinion, so the guilty can continue to either keep the money flowing, keep competing, maintain a lifestyle, and be perceived as trustworthy again.

                               

                              Armstrong has charisma. It's so apparent in this interview from the first moment. The camera loves this guys face. When he first started talking I thought "seems like a great guy." He was almost smiling and happy. That part of me that can be won over by a face and smile like Marion Jones' was activated. But I made a choice not to be entranced by the spectacle and try to see what's really going on. I saw an intelligent man making a calculated move to win me over.

                               

                              Like in Marion Jones' interview with Oprah, I get the sense of complicity on Oprah's part. Complicity in helping the subject create a better public persona. On the surface, they seem like tough questions, but the subject also seems completely prepared. It's not real journalism. That could be because Oprah has no intent to play "gotcha" and to humiliate in these interviews. It's not in her heart to do so. Her own public persona is all about personal growth and manifesting a better life. She's not Mike Wallace (60 Minutes). It seems like she's friends with the subject.

                               

                              If you listen close to Armstrong, you'll hear spin. The essence of what I heard was that using PED's was only leveling the playing field and giving him a chance to win. That what he did wasn't wrong at the time because he wasn't the only one. It was the culture. Any bullying was due to being a flawed person who was born that way. A person can't control what they're born with. In other words, he couldn't help bullying those who told the truth. He was a victim of his nature, like Jones was a victim of a bad decision made by her past self in one moment with the Feds.

                               

                              Spin.

                               

                              Anytime there's spin, it's an effort to manipulate. This interview is purely manipulation. A truly contrite person who has changed due to honest self-observation and an evaluation of his or her life doesn't need to manipulate like this. Mr. Armstrong could have just made his amends to those he truly screwed over or bullied, accepted the consequences of his actions, and moved on in creating a new life that expresses his new values. A life where he never breaks anyone's trust again. A life where he never manipulates for the sake of public persona, money, the freedom to compete, or winning. A life where he never bullies for any reason.

                               

                              This interview is a show. Its intent is to boost ratings for Lance Armstrong's public persona,  and Oprah's network. It's entertainment. A story to get lost in. But the story isn't real. The intent and purpose of it is. Just as the act of spin is real, but the content is just a tale intended to hypnotize and to "make believe".

                               

                              ADDENDUM (Oh, no, not an addendum!):

                               

                              Personally, there's nothing to forgive on my part in my relationship with Lance Armstrong. What is my relationship? He's just some guy I've seen on the TV playing a part in a story presented to me by the media. I don't know him. Probably never will. If I add up the time his image on the TV (or internet) has been part of my real life, it probably comes out to less than ten hours. In terms of the TV being entertainment, I should be grateful for the less than ten hours he's given to me, including last nights lesson on spin, make believe, and the art of public persona.

                                 

                                How does the saying go: Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me a million times over 15 years, shame on me?  Something like that.

                                 

                                For starters he's a proven liar who's used false emotion to deceive people for over 15 years whenever he has stood to gain personally. He seems more desperate than remorseful to me, but hey, maybe the truth will set him free.

                                Fair comment... time will tell.

                                But, for me, it seems as if he's begun a redemptive path to right his many wrongs.

                                He alluded to personal conversations with those that he's wronged and trying to right them.  He mentioned how far away those people are from forgiving him.  He blames nobody but himself.

                                 

                                One thing that didn't set right with me regarding the interview related to his comment about "not sitting here (doing the interview) if I didn't come back from retirement." (paraphrase theme, not quote...)  To me, that sounded like he was sorry he got caught and sorrry that he needs to right his wrongs rather than apologetic for his bad character and bullying.

                                Life Goals:

                                #1: Do what I can do

                                #2: Enjoy life