Roethlisberger is Sorry…But About What?

Recently, a Georgia District Attorney decided not to charge Pittsburgh Steelers Quarterback Ben Roethlisberger with sexual assault, due to a lack of evidence. In announcing the decision, the DA stated that his office was in no way condoning Roethlisberger’s actions by not charging him. The evidence simply wasn’t there to prove criminal activity. That’s very different than saying there was no evidence of wrongdoing.

After the announcement, Ben Roethlisberger read a brief statement, in which he offered an apology of sorts.

There’s a lot that could be analyzed in this short statement (including the same questions of sincerity, script reading and power that were problematic in Tiger Woods’ apology). But to keep this short, I’ll focus on the biggest issue I see with Roethlisberger’s “apology” – and that is the question of social values.

This is one of the most important underlying aspects of any apology, and it’s even more interesting when the apologist refers to his or her values, as Roethlisberger did near the end of his statement when he said he is committed to showing everyone his “true values.”

Why are Values So Important in Apologies?

The reality is, every apology is a discussion about values. Here’s why. Values help maintain a sense of order in a society. When people implicitly or explicitly accept those values, they are essentially accepting the terms and conditions of membership in that society.

When someone violates one of those values, it upsets that natural order – which results in conflict for the society as well as a sense of guilt and a loss of membership for the individual. To alleviate the conflict and be reaccepted in the group, the offender must expunge the guilt by offering an apology.

Through the apology process, then, people are actually negotiating their values. In other words, they’re making claims about what’s important to them, how they live together, and what they expect from one another.

So when a person offers an apology, that person is actually acknowledging that he should not have broken the value, and that he will live by that value going forward.

What IS Roethlisberger Sorry About Anyway?

With that in mind, let’s look at what Roethlisberger really said in his apology. To quote him, Roethlisberger said that he is “truly sorry for the disappointment and negative attention ” he brought to his family, teammates, the NFL, and others. The good news is, he actually admitted that the “disappointment” and “negative attention” were caused by his actions, rather than the situation. The bad news is, he’s really only saying he’s sorry for the negative attention, not the action that caused that attention. In other words, he’s sorry for the end result, not for the root cause.

To be fair, Roethlisberger does announce that he wants to take steps to earn the trust of his family, teammates, and fans. But without even implicitly acknowledging – let alone explicitly stating – what social values he broke or why they were wrong (i.e., how they hurt others…like, say, the victim), we’re really left wondering whether Roethlisberger is sorry at all or if he’ll refrain from such actions in the future.

The Takeaway Lesson

Before offering or accepting an apology, make sure the focus is on the right issue. Ask yourself: Who was directly and indirectly harmed? And, what is the underlying value that was broken? For example, if a husband apologizes for not doing the dishes, the dishes aren’t really the issue. The deeper issue probably relates to the values of “sharing the burden of household chores” or “respecting your spouse’s time.” Whether you’re the apologizer or the person receiving an apology, make sure the underlying value is the main point of the discussion and of the apology.

Cultural Expectations and Apologies in Gacaca Trials

As part of any analysis of apologetic rhetoric, I argue that we must first consider how the cultural context influences and shapes accusations and apologies. Although I don’t have the room in this post for an in-depth discussion of Rwandan culture, I would like to offer a very brief discussion of what Rwandans expect from apologies and how that impacts not only the rhetoric in gacaca trials, but also how we go about analyzing those exchanges.

In January 2009, I conducted field research in Kigali, Rwanda to help uncover how and why Rwandans apologize. Based on the interview and focus group discussions as well as the answers participants gave to the role-play interview questions, four common characteristics of a successful apology became evident: (1) a detailed narrative of the crime or offense, (2) a statement of sorrow combined with a request for forgiveness, (3) the demonstration of sincerity and heart-felt remorse, and (4) reparations (either symbolic or real).

One of the most distinct elements of Rwandan apologetic rhetoric is the importance of a detailed narrative of the offense or crime. According to the participants’ comments, rather than simply stating that an act was wrong, the apologist must explain in detail what happened, when it happened, and why it happened.

In addition to a detailed narrative of the wrongful act, the interview and focus group research uncovered a strong reliance on third-party participation. This aspect of third-party participation echoes, to some extent, Howard-Hassmann and Lombardo’s (2008) finding that apologies are often delivered publicly in African societies to acknowledge the crime or offense and to set the public record straight. For example, one participant who was quoted by Howard-Hassmann and Lombardo (2008) stated that “if there were witnesses to his misdeed, he might apologize in front of them, in front of village elders, or in front of the entire community” (p. 222).

These cultural expectations shape the setting and apologetic rhetoric of gacaca trials. In addition, these elements are evident in the structure of gacaca trials as well as the documentation. For instance, the gacaca trials are designed for community members to come forward and participate as witnesses, victims, and judges who not only attend and listen but actively participate and shape the narrative and, ultimately, the apology that the perpetrator delivers. Additionally, as I discuss below, a detailed narrative of each crime is recorded in official court documents in the form of a lengthy written explanation of the “details of how each crime was committed.”

In that sense, one should not analyze the apologetic rhetoric or the documents of gacaca trials without also considering the cultural setting and expectations from which they are derived.

RSA Presentation Proposals

I submitted the following proposals to present at the Rhetoric Society of America (RSA) conference in Minneapolis in May 2010. The first proposal was submitted as part of a panel on the intersection of religion, politics, and economics in Pope Benedict’s Caritas in Veritate. The second proposal was submitted as an individual proposal.

PROPOSAL ONE:

Title: Charity in Truth: A Righteous Rhetorical Vision of Economics and Technology

Abstract:

In Caritas in Veritate, Pope Benedict’s call for a new economic order puts forth a rhetorical vision that emphasizes humanness, morality and social justice. Often, such rhetorical visions can be categorized in one of three competing explanations of reality: pragmatic (valuing expediency, utility, and efficiency), social (valuing trust, caring, and relationships) or righteous (differentiating between right and wrong, moral and immoral, just and unjust).

In Caritas in Veritate, Pope Benedict denounces the pragmatic vision and instead puts forth a rhetorical vision that at times appears social—focusing on love, charity, and “human social relationships of friendship, solidarity and reciprocity.” However, such social references mainly function to establish charity as an important element in human relations as well as to position financial markets and technology as human realities with moral consequences, leading to a righteous rhetorical vision that asserts a higher calling for economics.

As the encyclical progresses, charity is transformed into a sanctioning agent used to demarcate moral economic policies and technological means from the immoral or unjust, turning Benedicts argument to his righteous rhetorical themes. These themes vilify unconstrained markets and purely technological progress as insufficient at best and destructive at worst.

The righteous themes not only become warrants in Pope Benedict’s argument for a new economic order, but also coalesce to construct a symbolic reality that explains today’s global recession and economic crisis.

This proposal was based on an early blog post that I revised and tightened.

PROPOSAL TWO:

Title: Politicizing Abstract Values Through Apologia: The Identical, Yet Contrastive Rhetoric of Representative Joe Wilson and the Dixie Chicks

Abstract:

On September 9, South Carolina Congressman Joe Wilson interrupted President Obama by shouting “You lie!” during the President’s speech to a joint session of Congress. Those two words set off a firestorm, as media pundits called Wilson’s outburst uncivil and House Democrats rebuked Wilson’s comment as a “breach of decorum” that “degraded the proceedings of the joint session, to the discredit of the House.”

After initially issuing an apologetic statement, Wilson transitioned from regret to defiance through public statements, an online video, web text and traditional media interviews in which he claimed he was “under attack by the liberals” and that he would “not be muzzled.”

Despite the politically divisive tone and situation, Wilson’s apologetic rhetoric actually shares a number of similarities with that of the ideologically opposed Dixie Chicks. Both spoke out against a sitting President and were denounced for their comments, including the timing and location in which they were made. Both initially issued an apology before taking a defiant stance. Both ultimately relied on a strategy of transcendence, claiming they were courageously speaking out against a wrong and, therefore, refused to be silenced by their enemy’s attacks.

The more important—perhaps, ironic—similarity between the Dixie Chicks’ apologia and Wilson’s apologia is that they both based their transcendence on the values of “freedom of speech” and “dissent.” In that sense, Wilson employed the same rhetorical strategy and argument that conservatives denounced the Dixie Chicks for using. Conversely, the same values that many liberals applauded the Dixie Chicks for upholding were argued by someone across the aisle.

This situation provides an opportunity to examine how nearly identical rhetorical stances can result in opposition and division when the claims not only overlap but compete to concretize—and politicize—abstract values as rhetors attempt to legitimize their own actions.

This proposal was based on early blog post that I tightened while adding the final point regarding concretization.

Charity in Truth: A Righteous Rhetorical Vision of Economics and Technology

Although I don’t always mention social justice and ethics explicitly, these concepts are at the heart of many topics that I study, including apologies as well as the use of new media to deliver product recall and safety information.

In this post, I focus on a slightly different topic—that is, Pope Benedict’s Caritas in Veritate. However, based on the Pope’s focus on the morality of economics and technology, this topic not only fits my research interests in terms of social justice and ethics, but also in terms of the role technology plays in our society’s growth and development.

BACKGROUND

On July 7, 2009, Pope Benedict XVI published Caritas in Veritate (meaning: Charity in Truth). In the encyclical, Pope Benedict presents a “vision of a new economic order” and “a rethinking of how economic life is organized” (De Souza, 2009). While the letter focused heavily on the global recession, its broader message addressed the issues of social justice and morality that are reflected in our economic policies and technical aspirations.

METHOD

Using Fantasy Theme Analysis, we can examine these ideas in more detail and uncover the underlying vision they promote. This method of rhetorical analysis is based on Ernest Bormann’s theory of symbolic convergence and is ideal for examining how common themes reflect rhetorical visions of heroes and villains, values and beliefs, and symbolic reality.

ANALYSIS

In Caritas in Veritate, Pope Benedict’s call for a new economic order puts forth a rhetorical vision that emphasizes humanness, morality and social justice.

Often these rhetorical visions can be categorized in one of three competing explanations of reality: pragmatic (valuing expediency, utility, and efficiency), social (valuing trust, caring, and relationships) or righteous (differentiating between right and wrong, moral and immoral, just and unjust).

In Caritas in Veritate, Pope Benedict denounces a “pragmatic” vision of economic growth and activity by criticizing the negative aspects of capitalistic competition, commercial logic, and technocratic utility.

Instead, he puts forth a rhetorical vision that at times appears “social”—focusing on love, charity, and “human social relationships of friendship, solidarity and reciprocity” (36). However, such social references mainly function to establish charity as an important element in human relations as well as to position financial markets and technology as human realities with moral consequences.

Ultimately, the rhetoric of Caritas in Veritate reveals a “righteous” rhetorical vision that chronicles immoral market activity and asserts a higher calling for economics.

As the encyclical progresses, charity is transformed from a dramatis personae or character in early social themes (such as charity as love, grace, and humanity) into a sanctioning agent that is used to delineate moral economic policies and uses of technology from those deemed immoral or unjust in Pope Benedict’s righteous rhetorical themes. These themes vilify free markets and purely technological progress as insufficient at best and destructive at worst.

In the end, the righteous themes not only become warrants in Pope Benedict’s argument for a new economic order, but also coalesce to construct a symbolic reality that explains today’s global recession and economic crisis.

Hearit’s Three-Act Play and Ideal Apologia

In “Crisis Management by Apology,” Keith Michael Hearit argues that an apologetic exchange can be viewed as a three-act play or ritual consisting of: an act, a charge of wrongdoing, and a defense. A critical element of this three-act play is the idea of guilt. In essence, the charge of wrongdoing is an assertion that an individual or organization has violated “some cherished social value” and, therefore, must purge the guilt of this violation and seek restoration into the community in the final act: the apologia.

Hearit also lays out a method for ethically judging the apologetic decisions of individuals and organizations. This method is based on two aspects of apologetic discourse: (1) the manner and (2) the content. In terms of the manner, Hearit asserts that, ideally, an ethical apologia is truthful, sincere, timely, and voluntary. It also addresses all stakeholders and is performed in an appropriate context (p. 64). However, in terms of the content, an ethical apologia should acknowledge wrongdoing, accept responsibility, express regret, identify with the victims, ask for forgiveness, seek reconciliation, disclose relevant information, provide an explanation that addresses the victims’ questions and concerns, and offer corrective actions and compensation.

It is worth noting that these characteristics describe the ideal or paradigm case of an ethical apologia. Therefore, an apologia that fails to meet one or several aspects is not necessarily unethical. Rather, it may be less ethical than the ideal, but still judged “ethically acceptable.” Moreover, there are at least five circumstances “that could justify departures from the paradigm case while still retaining the essential ethical character of an apologia.” These circumstances include: catastrophic financial losses, grave liability issues, a “moral learning curve,” questions over full-disclosure, and even situations where confidentiality or discretion are expected.