The death of the Pope is more than a news story; it’s a moment to pause.
The death of the Pope is more than a news story; it’s a moment to pause. A moment to consider the cultural value of humility, of grace. High-minded topics for a humble publicist.
Whether you admired him or regarded him with suspicion, he embodied something increasingly alien to public life: the notion that transgression can be met not just with judgment, but with the possibility of redemption.
A man whose role was steeped in the language of forgiveness and human frailty, his death is a stark reminder. On what we believe punishment should look like. On whether we still think people can change, or if we’ve quietly replaced the soul with infinite scrolling.
In his absence, I find myself wondering: Do we still believe people can overcome disgrace?
Because what I’ve seen, time and again, is a culture that doesn’t forgive.
It devours. Here’s the thing about modern media: it rarely tells the story. It suggests one. Once the blood is in the water, they’re not people anymore. They’re parables. Punchlines. Content. What’s most chilling isn’t the outrage. It’s the speed. The utter lack of appetite for anything remotely human.
And once the mob has sunk its teeth in, there’s no room for context—only spectacle. The fallen figure, crucified in public, is expected to do the decent thing and disappear. If they don’t, we make it our mission to finish them off.
I’ve sat with people after the avalanche caused by human error. Celebrities. Brilliant minds. Charismatic leaders. Vulnerable souls. All shattered by a cultural machine that has been hollowed out and discarded. The spiralling loss, not just of career and standing, but of identity. Of self. Families fracture. Friendships evaporate. The inbox falls silent. You become radioactive. And the great irony? The crowd that demands remorse rarely sticks around to witness it. There is no space for reflection. No scaffold for growth. Just the unmarked grave of a reputation and a scarred human being left to bury it.
But redemption has become an unfashionable concept. It’s slow, it’s uncomfortable, it asks us to reconsider our righteousness. And in a world fuelled by performance and punishment, who has the stomach for that?
And yet, I believe we must. Not because we should excuse transgression, but because we must build a better response to it than destruction.
If we want a better culture, it won’t come from perfect people. It will come from those who were broken and, somehow, allowed to return.
As a hashtagPR veteran, I must say this: we in the business need to ponder.
This isn’t just about optics. It’s about the cultural machinery we’re enabling.
You can’t spin your way out of a system that no longer believes in second chances. Managing reputations today means more than crisis control. It means asking better questions.
Because if redemption isn’t possible, then what are we building?
It’s not just our clients on the line.
It’s our collective conscience.