Just because a court of law has made its decision doesn’t mean you can’t be tried in the court of public opinion
Heavy legal maneuvering helped singer CeeLo Green avoid a possible rape case, settling for a plea of no contest to charges of slipping a woman ecstasy in her drink instead. Following that decision, the best move for Green would have been to lie low. Instead, he took to Twitter, making himself a candidate for our 2014 Weiner Awards in the process, posting gems like the below (we can no longer embed the tweets themselves because they have been deleted):
@CeeLoGreen: if someone is passed out they’re not even WITH you consciously! so WITH Implies consent
@CeeLoGreen: when someone brakes on (sic) a home there is broken glass where is your plausible proof anyone was raped
@CeeLoGreen: so if I TRIED but did NOT succeed but the person said I DID then what really happened?
If you found these a bit strange, and thought they cast yet more doubt on how innocent CeeLo might be, you aren’t alone. A massive Twitter backlash led to coverage across the ‘net and in traditional media, all of it (understandably) slanted against the singer, the last thing he needed if he was to weather this storm and get back to “business as usual” anytime soon.
Green’s original posts came on a Friday, and his reputation continued to take a thrashing over the weekend. Finally, he posted a tweet with quite a different tone:
I truly and deeply apologize for the comments attributed to me on Twitter. Those comments were idiotic, untrue and not what I believe.
— CeeLo Green (@CeeLoGreen) September 3, 2014
Green likely felt free to speak his mind because the judge’s decision had been made, but he forgot the power the court of public opinion holds, especially over the career of an entertainer. Already he’s been dropped from the lineup of two upcoming concerts, and his TBS show has been canceled. Although the network insists it was due to poor ratings, the timing is hard to ignore.
The BCM Blogging Team
https://www.bernsteincrisismanagement.com