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Public Adoration, Private Darkness

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By GRETCHEN PARKER, The Tampa Tribune

Published: September 13, 2007

Updated: 09/13/2007 12:22 am

Special Report: Previous Coverage, Video Reports

TAMPA - No matter how many times it happens, it's always a surprise. High-profile people are discovered to have a secret - something about their private lives so wholly disconnected from their public personas that it seems unbelievable.

The news last week was stunning. St. Petersburg City Councilman John Bryan, known as family man and a children's advocate, had inappropriate contact with his now-grown adopted daughter 20 years ago.

John Bryan

Hours after that and an accusation that he touched another of his adopted daughters became public, he resigned the council and killed himself in his garage.

Although it's impossible to know what was going on in Bryan's head, experts say there often are common threads that bind well-known public figures who have engaged in risky behavior despite the consequences.

There's no way to know what motivates people to make the decisions they make.

But there's something else - a behavior common in successful people - that can illuminate what triggers a scandal, said Marc Schoen, an assistant professor at UCLA who specializes in behavioral medicine.

All of us have a dark side, he said, but it's human nature to present ourselves in the best possible light.

In some people, having a dark side can drive them to succeed, to win public validation in a way that minimizes their own internal struggles, Schoen said.

'People grow up early on with a sense of feeling bad about themselves. Their primary mission in life is to try to compensate for that,' Schoen said.

Becoming well known and successful 'strokes that defectiveness, so they can feel good about themselves.'

The cracks can show, though, if those internal struggles and dark urges aren't controlled.

'It leaks out,' Schoen said.

President Clinton, he said, is the ultimate example of someone who drove himself to success but couldn't control his impulses. His affair with Monica Lewinsky, and efforts to cover it up, almost cost him the presidency.

When high-profile people do risky things in their private lives, New York psychologist Stanley Teitelbaum accounts for it using what he calls the 'toxic athlete profile.' He wrote a book last year called 'Sports Heroes, Fallen Idols,' but he says what happens to famous athletes sometimes happens to other public figures.

Essentially, they start to believe the hype.

Being prominent people, they get a lot of attention. In a way, they start to lose their balance. They start to believe they have special privileges, Teitelbaum said.

'Something goes off in their judgment because they've acquired this distorted self-image that allows them to cross certain boundaries and use poor judgment,' he said.

It's almost a sense of entitlement, he said.

There are many examples of people who got to the top of their game and then fell quickly.

These days, Schoen pointed out, with intense scrutiny from Web sites, entertainment news hounds and cable news networks - the dark stuff is bound to come out.

Is it that celebrities can't take the pressure of their own success? Sometimes, Schoen said.

He points out Britney Spears as someone who showed questionable behavior after fame arrived.

One explanation, though, is in itself a dark thought, he said.

The high-profile troubles we read about are the stuff of the masses as well, Schoen said. Child abuse, gambling, affairs - these problems cross all segments of society and have gone on forever.

Few secrets, however, win the scrutiny of those kept by the well known.

Reporter Gretchen Parker can be reached at gparker @tampatrib.com or (813) 259-7562.

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