What have we become? Smith as a sacrificial lamb to the god of sanctimony

Like most Australian reactions in these times, driven by social media we have become outrageously outraged in our hilltop castle of morality and political correctness whilst waiting for the next outrage subject to attract our interest.

And so it will come to pass with ball tampering.

There are any number of issues yet to be resolved. Were there only three players involved?

Does a willing acceptance of the team culture by other players implicate them just as much as the guilty three? Were the penalties unfair in respect of all three players? Should there have been a penalty over above the ICC sanctions?

Was the culture of the team in effect fostered and condoned by CA? These are questions which no doubt others are today examining.

The question I ask is ‘what have we become as a nation?’ If cricket is representative of wider Australian society then what does this sorry episode say about us?

(Photo by Paul Kane/Getty Images)

That we are ball tamperers says only that our cricketers are like others. We bend the rules. It has been thus since time immemorial when we did not have cameras instructed to capture breaches of the rules.

When batsmen did not walk because they knew that umpires were human and that for any time out was not out not out became out. When microphones did not pick up sledging.

What this sorry episode says about us is the way we now approach human frailties. Behaviour that is in all of us.

Last year Ben Stokes was involved in an assault in the UK. Outrage followed, to some extent justifiably. Stokes has the presumption of innocence but at least as to the facts we know what happened.

Stokes plea of not guilty does not change the video evidence. He was suspended and the general response from the England and Wales Cricket Board was that Stokes would not play until the charges which took an age to be laid had been dealt with.

(AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth)

He was duly omitted from the Ashes squad. A tick for hilltop castle morality and political correctness. Social media became a little bit confused by Stokes own defence that he was only coming to the issue of two gay men who were under threat of physical harm.

Stokes was but a white knight. It’s not hard to confuse social media. There are degrees of morality and political correctness and perhaps Stokes assault was only just. And so on.

However the Board maintained its moral stance. People guilty of brutal assault cannot play for England.

Or at least until March 2018. Stokes played in the first Test against NZ and is currently playing in the second.

Which brings me to the hypocrisy of this whole affair.

Steve Smith deemed by the Australian newspaper to be worthy of Australian of the year in January is now deemed worthy of public humiliation and death by a thousand cuts.

Why? He condoned tampering with a ball. An offence which went to the heart of the soul of this country. Our perception of ourselves as people without sin, fault or blame.

People with no need to constantly assess ourselves because we are perfect. And so CA was not satisfied with the ICC sanctions.

We are a far more enlightened society than that. Our standards are high and will continue to become exponentially higher.

What occurred was a serious breach of our code of conduct. So serious that the guilty participants would be required to be publicly shamed and humiliated in the court of social media. That court of fairness and well balanced informed sanctimonious pious individuals.

All with an opinion. All who consider themselves absolutely correct. All who know better than anyone else. All who are without sin and entitled to sit on the jury of outrage.

All of whom are smeared with hypocrisy.

Can I suggest we sit back and reflect? Let’s come down from the hilltop. Let’s stop pretending that we also are not frail, human and prone to errors of judgement. And that there are degree in errors of judgement. And that striking a man to the ground by way of assault does not equate messing with a piece of sandpaper.

By all means punish Smith, Cam Bancroft and David Warner. Smith should not be captain. A monetary fine. Then all of us should look at ourselves.

Me too has a noble objective. But one which at its extreme ignores the human state. We do not need McCarthyism in our cricket or our society. That will change nothing