Sometimes Silence Is Ethical

About two years ago, Nancy Reagan had her left breast surgically removed. Naturally we wanted to read all about it.

Public figures are public property and they have no right to privacy. No matter what.

Nancy Reagan knew as soon as she entered Bethesda Naval Hospital to have a breast lesion biopsied that no matter what the results, they would have to be made public.

After all, her husband’s colon polyps had made national news. In America, if we know anything about a President, we know about his plumbing.

So when Mrs. Reagan’s biopsy detected cancer and she decided to have her breast removed, we were all told about it.

This is for the public good, we told ourselves. Mrs. Reagan going public with her breast cancer would encourage other women to have themselves checked and face the process with courage.

That was our rationalization, anyway. Deep down, however, I think we just like to know what is going on with celebrities. We have an insatiable appetite for fact, fancy, or just plain gossip about the famous.

As it turned out, before she knew the results of the biopsy, Mrs. Reagan had made an important decision: if a malignancy was found, she wanted to have the breast removed immediately.

Needless to say, it was her decision to make. Needless to say, she made that decision after listening to the advice of the top doctors in the land. And needless to say, it was her breast.

None of which mattered.

Within minutes of Mrs. Reagan’s decision being made public, doctors went on live TV shows and criticized her. Other doctors were quoted in newspapers saying the same kind of things.

These doctors favored a two-step procedure in which a biopsy is done and then the patient delays her decision.

None of these doctors had examined Mrs. Reagan. None had talked to her. Yet all felt it was quite fair to criticize her in public.

“It’s going to set us all back,” a doctor at the University of Maryland was quoted as saying.

I wrote a column saying these kind of comments were grotesque and bordered on the unethical.

Who were these doctors to make comments on a patient they had never examined? And who were they to say that all women had to do exactly as they wanted? Didn’t Nancy Reagan have the right to make her own choice?

And even if they disagreed with Nancy Reagan’s choice, couldn’t they give her a break at this very trying time in her life? Couldn’t they avoid the media for some decent interval before making her feel like a worm who had let down the women of America?

Not many people agreed with me. A lot of women wrote and told me that Nancy Reagan had chosen the wrong procedure and she had no right to do it and public figures don’t get any breaks. Not in America they don’t.

This year, it is Kitty Dukakis’ turn in the barrel.

Mrs. Dukakis has had a long history of amphetamine and alcohol abuse, two problems that might have stayed private except that her husband--at her urging--ran for President.

And as we all know, a few weeks ago Kitty Dukakis drank rubbing alcohol and was rushed to a hospital for treatment.

Even without being psychiatrists or psychologists, we all realize that drinking rubbing alcohol is not a good sign.

But naturally we all wanted to know more. To put it crudely, we all wanted to know just how nuts Kitty Dukakis had become.

And so we found some experts to tell us.

The Boston Globe, the Dukakis’ hometown paper, interviewed four psychologists. The headline on the story was: “Therapists Speculate About Kitty Dukakis: Her Troubles May Be Tied to Husband’s, Psychologists Say.”

The psychologists analyzed Mrs. Dukakis for the paper, even though none had ever examined her. They explained why she took that rubbing alcohol, how her husband shared the blame and so on and so forth.

It was all hooey, of course. Grotesque hooey. Such opinions are worthless. But who cares? It made for good reading.

Now, the Massachusetts Board of Registration of Psychologists is investigating those four psychologists for possible violations of their ethical code.

Unfortunately, this board is appointed by Gov. Michael Dukakis and some see this as his revenge. Also unfortunately, some see this as a free press issue. It’s not.

The Boston Globe had a right to ask the questions it asked of those psychologists. And those psychologists had a right to tell the Globe to take a flying leap.

All they had to say was: “I never met the woman. I never examined the woman. So I have no idea. And it’s none of your business anyway.”

As a journalist, I don’t like to hear that kind of thing from people.

But every now and then, I respect them for saying it.