Does anyone else ever feel like their life could be The Truman Show?
The premise of that comedy, from the days when Jim Carrey was still funny, is that the main character’s entire life from the moment of birth on has been televised. The town he lives in is a set and all the people he knows are actors—and everyone he meets is in on the gag but him.
In actual reality television, if we can grasp that concept, from the 1973 PBS documentary “An American Family” to “Survivor” and “Real Housewives of Wherever,” we’re led to believe that the cast becomes so accustomed to the cameras they forget they are being recorded and begin to act without self-conscious filters. Or in “Real World” parlance, when “people stop being polite and start getting real.”
Most of us know that “reality” programs are not documentaries and what we see may have been edited to change context or re-staged for dramatic effect. Still, there are times when we are all characters in someone else’s reality broadcast, or the star of our own, even if we’re not aware of it. There are security cameras everywhere—banks, convenience stores, warehouses, private homes and even traffic lights. We don’t know if those cameras are rolling or who looks at the images. And on top of that, in any given group of 10 people, at least eight will have a video camera on their person.
We now have candid videos of people engaged in both deplorable and admirable behavior. One thoughtless or careless act could end up the next viral video embarrassment. The fact is, you never know when someone is watching, so you should assume someone always is.
Take for example the communications pro in the Department of Defense’s public affairs office who didn’t like that the nanny employed by one of his neighbors regularly parked, legally, on the street near his townhouse. So for months he engaged in a campaign of harassment that involved, more than once, stealing the license plates from her vehicle. So her employers bought a surveillance camera, and caught him in the act. Whatever was going through his mind, it was clear he wasn’t expecting to get caught. He was not able to remove the sources of his annoyance. Instead, he had to pay $1,000 in restitution, perform 32 hours of community service and suffer the embarrassment that accompanies having your story featured on The Washington Post’s website.
“Dance like there’s nobody watching,” is a line from the song “Come from the Heart,” written by Susanna Clark and Richard Leigh, and recorded by the late, great Guy Clark, among others, intended to encourage listeners to have the courage to be themselves. I applaud that notion but instead encourage people to dance like everybody’s watching. Because they just might be.
Mark Zuckerberg apparently feels that way, at least according to several stories that cropped up online recently about how he allegedly put a piece of tape over the webcam on his laptop.
So what should you do if you’re caught in an embarrassing video? Here are three tips:
Admit It
Don’t say it never happened or that’s not you on the video. You’ll only make yourself look worse.
Apologize
But make sure it’s a real apology, not “I’m sorry if anyone was offended,” which is another way of saying, “I meant what I said or did and can’t believe you’re making such a big deal about it.”
Move On
This is the hardest part, but try and laugh at yourself, learn from the experience and let it go.
If you find yourself in a sticky situation, our tips can help. Download our free ebook to learn more about how to prepare for a crisis and turn it into an opportunity:
[Editor’s note: Some usually authoritative sources credit the line “Dance like there’s nobody watching,” or a variant of it, to a number of different authors, including Mark Twain, the legendary ballplayer Satchel Paige and noted educator William W. Purkey. But they’re all wrong. Like much pithy wisdom and great advice, it comes from a country song.]
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