Friday column: Bad things happen in the gap between tale and truth

A gap lies between authentic and inauthentic — between what a person purports to be and what a person is — and that gap is a bad place to be.

Ask Mark Sanford.

Or Eliot Spitzer.

Or John Edwards.

No, those we find in such gaps aren’t always politicians. We also find athletes there — Hello, David Ortiz — and teachers and clergy and journalists and … well, you get the point.

In fact, I’m not sure it’s possible in this life for any person and persona to be 100 percent aligned. But when it comes to authenticity gaps, there are rifts and then there are chasms.

Lance Armstrong saying he was “really happy, perfectly happy” to serve as a support rider for Alberto Contador at this year’s Tour de France — when he clearly hates the Spaniard’s guts — that’s a rift in authenticity.

A 24-year-old woman claiming to be a teenage cancer victim in need of funds for a life-saving operation in a scam that fools Armstrong — a hero to many cancer patients — that’s a chasm.

“Jonathan Jay White” was supposedly a 15-year-old from Idaho with brain cancer. On a blog, “Jonathan” said he wanted to become a doctor and perform “medical miracles.” But first he needed a miracle himself, an operation he didn’t have the money for. People stepped up to help.

Except there was no Jonathan, no cancer. There was Melissa Ann Rice from Ammon, Idaho, and into the crevasse she created a number of people tumbled, including Armstrong and several other celebrities with good hearts.

The chasm also claimed cancer charities and regular folk who sent in donations. Other victims include the thousands of people who followed the boy’s story on his blog.

Also victimized, of course, is anyone truly needing help who might not get it now because people will wonder, “How do I know this story isn’t a scam?”

Large gaps in authenticity are pernicious. As in earthquakes, damage fans out in every direction. But damage is also significant at the epicenter. Such gaps are openings for evil, whether one thinks of such evil in theological or psychological terms.

The week “Jonathan” was supposed to arrive in Arizona for surgery — after receiving an encouraging Twitter message from Armstrong — Rice contacted the charities and confessed fraud. Days later Melissa Ann Rice was found dead in her car, an apparent suicide.

The last line in a report about her death read, “Neighbors in her apartment complex … said they didn’t know her.”

I’m quite certain they didn’t. My guess is that a person creating that large of a divide between tale and truth isn’t known even to herself.


Contact Jim Gordon at gjames43@msn.com.