This is a sample of The Echidna newsletter sent out each weekday morning. To sign up for FREE, go to theechidna.com.au

Login or signup to continue reading

Go on, admit it. Like everyone else, you took pleasure in Astronomer CEO Andy Byron and his HR chief Kristin Cabot's global cringe moment at the Coldplay concert. You're only human, after all, and that schadenfreude was too delicious to pass up.

The infidelity of two bosses was caught on the big screen and instantly went viral. The horror on their faces as they ducked for cover when they saw themselves up there on the big screen, in a loving embrace, despite both being married. To other people.

For a moment, the world stopped talking about war, the Epstein client list, and Donald Trump's swollen ankles. It was all about the kiss cam, a weapon of mass distraction.

By day's end, there was hardly an organisation or company that hadn't incorporated the image into a social media post of their own. The few seconds of acute shame launched a thousand memes.

Once I'd stopped chuckling, a troubling thought crossed my mind. What of their families? The torment they must feel at this most public outing of an unfaithful husband and wife would be excruciating. If Byron sank to the floor when he realised he'd been sprung, his family has likely dug a giant hole and disappeared into it.

We've all suffered terrible embarrassment in our lives. But rarely is it captured on camera and broadcast widely. When it does happen, it's a sickening feeling. I know this because I speak from experience.

My moment of infamy came in the late 1970s. I'd called in sick to my public service job so I could take part in a protest outside Old Parliament House in Canberra. I was blissfully unaware that a TV cameraman had taken a shot of me in full chant, fist raised in youthful anger, which featured prominently in a news report that........

© The Examiner