The Word Goes Out: It's Not My Fault!

By Rick Horowitz

At least we know who's responsible.

When this kind of thing happens -- a star of such magnitude yanked so shockingly from the firmament -- nothing can ever put it right again. But there can be some comfort, at least, in understanding how the awful event occurred, in comprehending just what forces conspired (if only unwittingly) to spark the disaster. In holding the proper people accountable.

And now we can do that: hold the proper people accountable, that is. Though the crash that took her life happened only days ago, and though new details -- now alcohol, now taunts -- continue to seep out with every news cycle, we can already say with fair assurance precisely who's to blame for the death of Diana, Princess of Wales.

Somebody else.

Have you ever seen such squirming? Such ducking and dodging? From the moment the news hit the air on Saturday night, all through the rest of the weekend and on into the new week, the twin themes have sounded from every quarter:

* "It's so tragic!"

* "Of course, we had nothing to do with it."

The first of these comes easily to the tongue; the second requires a bit more effort. After all, the average person, hearing the circumstances surrounding Diana's grisly end, might be inclined to leap to conclusions, to pick up a broad brush and slap a quick coat of "Guilty" on certain people.

Fortunately, the anything-but-average persons who found themselves before the cameras all weekend, who were torn away from their various Hamptons and the like to offer explanation and analysis -- these people were eager (or was it desperate?) to draw somewhat finer distinctions.

Was the press to blame? Certainly not, insisted the editors of the high-tone papers; there's press, and then there's press. Don't lump us in with the tabloids, they said. Different kettle of fish -- not at all the kind of thing we do. Perfectly dreadful, actually.

The tabloids, it turns out, were happy to draw distinctions of their own. They're not our employees, they insisted, those paparazzi who take all those intrusive and embarrassing pictures, who had hounded the Princess and her glittery ilk day after day, year after year. They're "independent" photographers.

We may have run a few of their pictures now and again, the tabloids conceded -- paid quite a lot for them, actually -- but that's different. We'd never tell anyone to chase down a limousine on a motorbike. Perfectly dreadful. Anyway, the limo driver was drunk, wasn't he?

There are tabloids, it turns out, and there are tabloids. The American tabloids were busily insisting that the European tabloids were far more intrusive, far more likely to cause an incident, an accident. And then there was the American tabloid editor quick to explain how his tabloid was even less intrusive than other American tabloids. We told the "stalk-arazzi" we wouldn't deal with them, he said.

The "stalk-arazzi"?

There are paparazzi, it turns out, and there are "stalk-arazzi" -- a new breed of photographer, even more aggressive, willing to do anything to get the shot. It must be hard to draw distinctions among paparazzi. There were people willing to try.

Anyway, said the paparazzi, it's not our fault these privacy-busting pictures run all over the place. It's not our fault either, said the tabloid editors who run them. This fascination with celebrity isn't something we invented. We're just giving the people what they want.

It's their fault.

And then there was the famous network correspondent, sitting there with the other famous network correspondents, trying to make sense of it all -- Diana's life, Diana's death. On they went, hour after hour, showing the famous photographs, bemoaning the ever-expanding star-snooping industry that had produced every frame.

Finally, the famous network correspondent, whose own celebrity rests largely on her interviews with other celebrities, on her ability to get prominent people to spill their deepest secrets for public consumption -- finally this correspondent worried aloud whether even she might have crossed the line from time to time, whether she herself might have contributed to the very problem she was now lamenting.

But she got over it.

9/2/97