That's a real question, not rhetorical.
Their friends, along with the members of the media as fascinated with them as many fans have been, along with their families, declare that Tessa/Scott are great people. Part of it is Virtue Moir's talent, and their willingness to challenge that talent. Partly it's they're gracious and unentitled in person. Some of it is just good showing - poised, patient, always with the game face.
For example, there's the family friend who posted on her facebook that Scott and Tessa are "such good kids and always will be - what you see is what you get" despite the fact that she's a sham contributor and has helped them lie. ("You two are the best couple on earth!" is an example of her captioned enthusiasms under facebook sham spam). But when she says things like "What you see is what you get" - she believes it.
I think it goes to a parochial mindset cut through with immaturity. It's the entitlement and complacency that comes from "We're right because of who we are, not what we do." They're undisciplined, and unwilling to think critically or challenge assumptions they hold about themselves.
Who are the targets of the sham right now? The media? Most of those who interview them know they're together.
It's the public? Just the Canadian public? Is it the fans in front of whom they frequently don't even pretend they're not together?
What about those "dedicated" (™ Scott Moir) skating ladies?
Or the crazies that EVERYBODY in the public eye has?
The internet? Who gives a fuck about under a hundred people on the internet - so much that you market a years-long program of ridiculous and insulting lies? That's not a problem - that's a nuisance. Stop thinking about it and it's not even a nuisance.
It's all Tessa and Scott self-indulgence and ego. They were anticipating revealing their status long before now, but when they realized they could get away with the pregnancy they decided why not continue to Sochi.
What they do now isn't necessary. It's not important to their mental health, to sustaining their personal life, to protect anything. They do it because they can. If you can treat a group of people you don't respect without respect and get away with it, why not do it? That's them.
If they had revealed their status, there would be no significant fallout. The media ignores what Tessa and Scott want ignored, emphasizing only what Tessa and Scott want emphasized. How often has a media package referred to their dramatic withdrawal at the 4CCs, for example? About never, I believe. That served its purpose and now it's like it never happened. The media would likewise ignore the lies in the book, the lies in their interviews, the anecdotal fables, the gratuitous embellishments and gaslighting.
When has anyone ever decided to notice that Tessa and Scott were in public together during the time they claim to have been completely out of touch, that they appeared on television for an interview, that a close associate of theirs, while commentating at Canadians, told us that both Tessa
and Scott were away during her recovery, not just Tessa, because Scott was with her? Again, never.
There would be no can of worms. Fans would know their status, that's all.
It's power. They don't want fans to officially know (unofficially is fine) because Tessa and Scott want to hold onto the power they have to manipulate in petty ways and in what they once may have imagined are important ways.
There are no more important ways. There's no "the power to protect our privacy." Scott's own confused and inane explanations about getting side-eyed from fans (which doesn't bother him) while at the same time, keeping hands-in-pockets so as not to - what? Bump into somebody who also recognizes him but now he has to receive direct eye contact or suffer a greeting? - matched with their habit of baiting and stirring the pot, along with their correct insistence that they can go under the radar whenever - their privacy doesn't hinge on pretending to be platonic on social media. Their control of legit media has never depended on it either. The coy come ons and games they play show that's nonsense.
There's just pathetic and petty left. They like being one up, knowing something the fans don't, pulling fans' strings, reading how wrong fans are about everything, thanks to the lies they push on the fans, thanks to stringing fans along and setting them up to be wrong.*
How can you be convinced Tessa/Scott are wonderful people unless you believe the skating public are nobodies who don't count?
Social media happens mostly outside legit media, certainly broadcast media, so Scott and Tessa can treat fans with their characteristic mean spiritedness without it being held against them. Legit media prefers to ignore it because legit media is generally not a fan of social media either. Legit media prefers to control the narrative, and social media challenges that.
Virtue Moir go out of their way to remind fans of their pariah status. They could throw up a photo on
www.virtuemoir.com, especially after Scott directed fans there once he left his fan facebook. It's not neglect. They do things like direct fans there and then ignore it on purpose. They don't want fans. They don't like fans.
(ETA - they've now changed the photo on www.virtuemoir.com, and lo, is it a new photo like the first two? Of course not. That would be sharing something. It's two stills from a gala performance everybody's seen from every possible angle already. It's Scott's fan facebook all over again.)
Some people have blamed the blog. Oh the blog has harrassed them.
Yes, because they never lied to fans before the blog. And because an ice dance team that wasn't together would let their buttons be pushed by some insane blog claiming they were. The only reason they let themselves react to the blog is they're together and married, have a child, and they're lying.
So let's say they're pissed because how dare some nobody (which is everyone who isn't them, someone they know, or someone of high status) call them out? So what you do is continue to treat countless well-intentioned people like garbage because you think it helps you score points against an anonymous blog.
If it wasn't the blog, they'd find another reason to piss on fans, believe me. They will always find an excuse.
It also makes Scott's friends feel important. So there's that. We all like to feel important by screwing with anonymous nobodies, or with people stupid enough to take us at our word.
Maybe Scott and Tessa are in the category of neurotic insecure people who aren't comfortable unless there's people they can look down on, and in the skating world and among family and friends, they're in a top dog position where this egocentricity is indulged. Maybe having extraordinary talent has made them believe they're extraordinary PEOPLE, superior to common people who have to pay for tickets to skating competitions, who can't skate the way Tessa and Scott can.
I think there's one category of people that don't excuse and rationalize Scott and Tessa, and that category is figure skaters. Figure skaters with more natural humanity and empathy than Scott and Tessa, skaters who don't resent it when they have to breathe the air others breathe. Skaters who are flattered when fans put together a video or some other shout out because these figure skaters are grateful there are people "out there" who notice and appreciate the work they put in. Figure skaters who see Scott and Tessa actively working to alienate a public other skaters would kill to have and don't say anything in public ... right now.
Scott and Tessa don't need the public. They don't care about post-eligible blowback. They're set. The judges will give them the points. They'll have money whether they suck up to the public or not - they're not financially insecure. Since they don't need fans, why bother treating fans with common decency? One of the axioms of good business is to allocate resources where it will generate the best return, and public good will isn't something Scott and Tessa give a shit about.
There's no incentive for them to be decent, so they're not. I know it's noticed by fellow skaters who'd make different choices even if they found themselves in Scott and Tessa's impossible-to-understand, unique position. You know what it is? Disappointing that they haven't the courage in their public life that they have on the ice, and it's fans who get the fallout from that.
______________________
*Callback to Scott saying anyone who thinks Tessa is too sweet and innocent for Carmen doesn't know her at all.
Isn't that what you both want, Scott? Nobody to know either of you at all, not even the basics about your marital status? How can you say something like that, when if people don't know Tessa it's because of her decisions and yours? You're the one whose used "sweet" as the go-to adjective for years whenever you were asked to describe her. Just because this year the promo spin for Carmen is different doesn't mean it makes sense to scoff at people who think of Tessa as sweet, mostly thanks to everything you've said.
