Why We Love Scandal

Slate reports on why we love us a good summer scandal, whether its Gibson or Blago: “If communities are enclaves of shared norms, then scandals are what consolidate a community. They organize our hatreds. The media may whip things up for motives of its own, but it’s our proprieties that have to be breeched, and we care about these breeches deeply. Especially we who play by the rules: Ours is the glee of bitter conformists. … Typical scandals involve sex, money, ambition, cheating—in short, someone wants more of something than they’re socially entitled to. Thus does scandal lure its quarry: intemperate appetites, bad self-management, a zeal for power—scandal’s playground, all.”