orgy

you would never have thought that a simple private orgy, albeit it one that had multiple prostitutes went on for 5 hours and took place in a dungeon, would have merited much media attention. but you would be wrong.
for all of the uproar you would have thought that max mosley was indulging in caligula like excesses rather than giving his little soldier a bit of exercise.
part of the allegations brought against max is that part of the fun was a bit a nazi style s&m role-play. there in lies the (body) rub as max mosley is the son of sir oswald mosley, the wartime leader of the british union of fascists, and hero to jay. (it is nice to note that even though he was a fascist we still refer to him as “sir”, good to see politeness still holds sway.)

quite way anyone cares about what max mosley does in his spare time is beyond me, though i am impressed with his stamina, can only hope i still have that get up and go in me when i get to his age (actually wouldn’t mind it now).
the news of the world thought differently and paid a lot of money to one of the prostitutes for the story and the pictures.

mosley is an international figure because of his involvement with formula 1 racing. he is one of the men that make sure that a very repetitive sport (the cars they go round and round and round) and very wasteful sport (the cars they burn up lots and lots of fuel to go round and round) earns lots and lots of money.
he seems to have been very successful at it.

formula 1 is not a moral sport. the stars of formula 1 are not role models they are mostly icons of conspicuous consumption.

the problem, it appears, isn’t what max mosley was up to but that he got caught

we live in a celebrity obsessed culture so that anything that happens to a celebrity (no matter how minor) is seen as being newsworthy, and if it has the whiff of scandal then so much the better.

given the nature of formula 1, cars going nowhere fast, what max does in the (dis)comfort of his dungeon should be a matter for him and him alone. just as it is the right of people who may have to deal with mosley not to want to shake hands with him (after all you never know where that fist might have been). shunned he seems to have been by the great and the good of the formula 1 world, apparently he is not welcome in places such as china or saudi arabia – both places which have sterling human rights and are fine examples of moral probity.

mosley decided not to go quietly (apparently this is what people do when they have been caught doing something private) he said lets put it to the vote.
they did.
he won.
now people are complaining that the process was not fair.
democracy it seems only works when you are winning.

the key argument seems to be that max mosley is the public face of formula 1 and is now compromised in this position. when in reality he is the public face to the sponsors and teams. he is the same person he was before the revelation of his orgiastic behaviour was broadcast to everyone. he is still as capable of doing his job now as he was then.

the role model argument is a convenient one to throw out. just whom is he supposed to be a role model to? i am sure he finding out that mosley spends five hours in a dungeon is not going to create a rush on the local s&m hangouts as all the “kids” want to try out a bit of leather and pvc action. true he may inspire a few conservative mps to follow suit but i am sure they already have a few numbers of their own to call.
it wouldn’t be so bad if the news of world, which broke the story, was not a newspaper (and i use the term lightly) that was littered with adverts for premium rate call lines many of which have a s&m flavour to them. expect a “ride max to the finish line” call service soon.

as mosley’s job has nothing to do with public health or public morality the only “public interest” aspect of the story was to titillate. in this our free press plays its very own role in the nanny state that it so often derides.
perhaps mosley’s problem was that he has made lots of money, gained lots of influence without being a creation of the media. unlike the amy winehouses and peter dohertys of the world there has been no chance of building them up and stripping them down, pretending that they should be role models for children and teenagers around the world. the constant cycle of building up and breaking down sells the papers. so in the cases of the media stars you know that they are always going to be coming back to help sell papers.

in mosley’s case he is a one hit wonder so they may as well go all out and destroy him. no matter that their expectations of how he should live his life are probably out of step with most of us and out of step of most of the adverts they run in their paper.