Two And A Half Man-Children

Andy Dick-less?

Stars, they’re just like us… We’re reminded pictorially in every issue of US Weekly. Kiefer Sutherland goes shopping. Miley Cyrus looks ashamed of her dad. Lara Flynn Boyle bleaches her sphincter. All of the snapshots of our parallel celebrity lives are supposed to make us feel closer, more comparable to our idols. It’s almost as if we, too, could get our money for nothing and our chicks for free.*

Yet if we are willing to see ourselves in the mundane activities of the glorified, mustn’t we also recognize our failures in the transgressions of the rich and infamous? Doesn’t the fault lie in our stars AND ourselves?

Where is the US Weekly photo spread depicting Gary Coleman (allegedly) abusing his wife?  Or Andy Dick (allegedly) disrobing a minor… or (allegedly) groping a bouncer? Or of Charlie Sheen(allegedly) choking his wife, Brooke Mueller? Or, Charlie (allegedly) brandishing a knife? Or, Charlie accidently (and admittedly!) discharging a firearm and wounding then-fiancee Kelly Preston?

Gary Coleman-child?

It is tempting to highlight these incidents as the fleeting foibles of a few bad actors, yet we must acknowledge that these, too, are reflections of our own worst traits. We are the rotten barrel. Domestic violence is neither an exception to the norm nor a TMZ triviality. Check out these disturbing statistics culled by the American Bar Association…

• Approximately 1.3 million women and 835,000 men are physically assaulted by an intimate partner annually in the United States.
  

  Patricia Tjaden & Nancy Thoennes, U.S. Dep’t of Just., NCJ 183781, Full Report of the Prevalence, Incidence, and Consequences of Intimate Partner Violence Against Women: Findings from the National Violence Against Women Survey, at iv(2000), available at http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/nij/pubs-sum/183781.htm

• Intimate partner violence made up 20% of all nonfatal violent crime experienced by women in 2001.
  

  Callie Marie Rennison, U.S. Dep’t of Just., NCJ 197838, Bureau of Justice Statistics Crime Data Brief: Intimate Partner Violence, 1993-2001, at 1 (2003), available at http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/ipv01.pdf

• In 2000, 1,247 women and 440 men were killed by an intimate partner. In recent years, an intimate partner killed approximately 33% of female murder victims and 4% of male murder victims.
  

  Callie Marie Rennison, U.S. Dep’t of Just., NCJ 197838, Bureau of Justice Statistics Crime Data Brief: Intimate Partner Violence, 1993-2001, at 1(2003), available at http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/ipv01.pdf

Charlie (Lost His) Sheen

Granted, Carlos Irwin Estevez has done more harm than his share, but neither he nor the entirety of his hate-mongering Hollywood brethren can explain the horrifying prevalence of domestic violence in this country. This is not solely a showbiz phenomenon. Sadly, this is an American epidemic. And until we respond to it more seriously, spouses and partners are doomed to suffer both behind  closed doors and in the public eye.

Charlie Sheen returns to his sitcom and his well-documented ways. Andy Dick returns to the comedy club, bailed out by the owner, so that the show might go on. Gary Coleman returns to virtual obscurity, a Trivial Pursuit punchline. What is most alarming is that these alleged offenses are not the first for these two and a half men. Each has a string of arrests and allegations that ought eliminate the need for the “other side of the story” and validate the identification of the common denominator, the recidivist perpetrators themselves. Charlie Sheen should be incarcerated. Gary Coleman should be jailed. Andy Dick, at the very least, should see a therapist by court-order and serve the community by judge’s will, as well.

Tiger Woods cheated on his wife, lost many of his endorsement deals and has gone into hiding. Charlie Sheen has used his words, his fists, a gun and a knife in abusing a succession of mates and yet he’s still promoted on primetime tv? Maybe it’s time for us to boycott CBS or, at least, beg the network to re-title its hit show: One and A Half Men and One Chronically Abusive, Chauvinistic, Rage-aholic Ass.

* With apologies to Mark Knopfler and Lynn Schnumberger