JORDAN HARTSHORN
Sports Writer

What’s most sickening about the recent Brett Favre media circus isn’t the alleged act but the trite masculine excuses used to pardon him.

Although the story has been brewing for some time over at deadspin.com, on Oct. 8 the Gawker sports blog released purported voicemails and photos Favre sent former New York Jets sideline reporter Jenn Sterger in 2008 during his tenure with the club. The voicemails were pathetic attempts of courtship, while the photos don’t skirt the issue: waist down shots of male genitalia.

Now, this very well may prove to not be Favre despite the mounting evidence to the contrary: Sterger’s word, a voice similar to Favre’s in the voicemails, the cell number bearing an area code from Favre’s native Mississippi and the fellow in the photos sharing a common wristwatch with Favre. The NFL says they’re looking into the matter, and for the meantime “allegedly” will have to be stamped on any related story.

And if Favre proves to be this digital-age exhibitionist, he’s joining a litany of modern day athletes with a penchant for sending nude photos of themselves to their girlfriends or what not. That doesn’t pardon those who send their endowment unsolicited, but reveals that the bizarre, hyper-masculine practice is in place.

The reaction to Favre’s cell- phone camera antics are no doubt heightened by his stature and intended audience. At 41, Favre is one of the highest profile athletes in America’s most-watched sport and has a reputation for being a salt of the earth figure who loves his family and the game. Sterger, meanwhile, was an employee of the Jets at the time. Although no victims of sexual harassment should be treated as special cases, Sterger’s place within the organization makes this an instance of work-place harassment and puts the onus on the NFL and New York Jets to make amends. To complicate things further, it’s alleged Jets’ press relations rep Jared Winley, who corroborated to get Favre Sterger’s number.

This isn’t a matter of “boys will be boys,” despite what some will have you believe. Sports figure Stephen A. Smith inanely called Deadspin on some sort of bro-code violation, saying on his Twitter account that “men know what a lot of men do and on most occasions we mind our business.” Yes, Smith is an often dismissed buffoon. But it was alarming to see those words echoed by Yahoo! Sports Dan Wetzel, who has never hesitated to be sanctimonious about issues in the sporting world in the past. Wetzel excused Favre for just “trying to pick up women” and saying that “meetings of the Monogamous Quarterback Club are generally small affairs.”

Cute, but that’s besides the point.

Athletes cheating on their wives may be older than Athens itself. However, cheating within a relationship breaks the code of ethics defined between two people, but unsolicited sexual exhibitionism is a violation of society’s ethics and social contract.

Sterger is right to call Favre a “creepy douche” if Favre is in fact found guilty of the alleged promiscuous infraction. Whimsy and conversation are elements of courtship, not whipping one’s dick out.

What’s worse is when people claim that Sterger, like Ines Sainz before her, invites such conduct because of their feminine qualities.

Sure, Sterger isn’t a sideline reporter in the traditional, journalistic sense. She wasn’t working for a television network which required her to dig up stories and actually report. Sterger was part of the team’s public relations machine, meant to entertain more than enlighten and her appearance and notoriety helps.

But saying her attractiveness brought this upon her is as primitive and backwards as saying rape victims bring it upon themselves by appearing appealing.

Brett Favre’s penis was not in her job description.

Others make the erroneous claim that bringing to light Favre’s lewd acts is an unfair, uncouth way of sullying a man’s reputation for its own sake. It’s unfortunate his family has to take the shrapnel from Favre’s choices but his questionable conduct would become a part of who he is.

Besides, his reputation is more mythos than reality. Favre’s narrative, that of a happy-go-lucky, “gunslinging” family man, is more the product of lazy sports journalism, massaging the image of an everyman that resonates with middle America. People have wanted Favre to be that man and who could question it? Hell, he’s a spokesman for Wrangler’s. He might as well wear a blue collar.

As it stands, Favre isn’t guilty. But if he is, he’ll have to accept the ramifications of any fallen sports hero and no old boys club posturing should make him an exception.

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image: Flickr