Ask a true Wisconsinite to describe Brett Favre and they will say that he is too old. Too old to be playing football, and definitely too old to be sending sexually explicit and disturbing pictures. Unlike the disturbances most elderly people cause, which are over pancakes in Perkins, Favre’s ruckus extends well past his usual haunt of the NFL into the realm of sexual harassment and immoral behavior.

Granted, Favre is not as old as most Perkins regulars, and if he weren’t an athlete, he wouldn’t be old by any reasonable standard. It is perhaps unfair to the other grandparents to compare them to Favre, but regardless, he is just plain old. Perhaps society is partly to blame for Favre’s actions; after all, we do tend to indulge the whims of the old, and we generally expect bad behavior from professional athletes.

However,this doesn’t let Favre off the hook, since he, and his peers, need to be held to account for their personal failings. Without insisting upon any particular moral code for all atheletes, I would assert an indication of some sort of personal moral standards on their part would be nice. But then, this is from someone who chose Fantasy Football players based on the amount of charity work they’ve done.

So we all know Favre is apparently willing to aggressively pursue a sideline reporter almost half his age while his wife deals with breast cancer, and that he’s an absolute cad for doing so. Keep that thought in mind as we take a little trip to Virginia to one Krystal Ball.

Krystal Ball is running for Congress in Virginia’s First District, but she’s probably more famous (or infamous) for pictures of her and her former husband at a Christmas party. Ball got into the spirit of the holiday with a Mrs. Claus costume that undoubtedly made some people quite jolly, and her husband went as a…modified Rudolph. Google it if you want the specifics. Since the appearance of the photos (which were taken 6 years ago), Ball has been lambasted for her apparent inability to be an effective Representative. Ball has responded by arguing that the reaction to the pictures is sexist; she’s a female politician, which threatens people, so they feel the need to characterize her as a ‘whore.’ Correct me if I’m wrong, but the last time I checked, making poor decisions and taking pictures does not constitute prostitution.

Obviously, there are gaping differences between Favre and Ball. Favre decided to do something perverse and force it on someone else. Ball and her husband wore questionable costumes to a Christmas f?te and took pictures, which were posted online six years later by an unidentified third party.

Favre has been attacked as a terrible husband and a generally bad person. He will not make it onto my Fantasy Football team. He’ll (hopefully) get suspended for a time, then hold (yet another) tearful press conference, retire, come back and try not to break his record for most fumbles. Ball, on the other hand, will lose her race (although she was probably going to anyway), and will be forever remembered both in and out of the polls for those pictures.

I’m trying to say there’s a bit of an unequal standard here. I don’t know enough about football to pick players based on anything other than charity work and bye-weeks, but I do know enough about politics to be able to separate issue stances from personal fallacies.

Maybe you’re fine wearing a Brett Favre jersey after this; he does hold the record for the career touchdown passes, after all. Maybe you would vote for Krystal Ball if you lived in Virginia’s First District, because you agree with her ideas about educational reform.

We hold people to different standards based on who they are and how well we understand what they do. Do Krystal Ball’s former wardrobe choices affect her ability to understand policy problems? Why is she being judged professionally for a bad personal decision, while Favre is being judged personally for a legally reprimandable act? These are questions society must ask.

While I don’t have the answers, two things are clear: Ball should stop calling herself Hillary Clinton, and Favre should stop being so disturbing and finally go to Perkins where he belongs.

Elise Swanson ([email protected]) is a sophomore majoring in political science and English.