I don’t spend much, if any, time keeping up with the personal lives of performers –actors, artists, musicians, and such– until it’s almost unavoidable (everyone on the planet is talking about it). Too often, when confronted with the lives of the people whose work I admire and respect, I find a can’t stand the person, and then I can’t stand their work either. Mel Gibson is a perfect example.

I used to adore Mel Gibson as an actor. He was good at acting. Maybe he still is, but I don’t bother watching his movies anymore, and that started well before he publicly began to lose his mind. I caught him being interviewed on some entertainment show once a long time ago, and he said something about his wife that set off bells in my brain. Gave me the impression he was an asshole, and I lost respect for him and thus also his work. I was sad and angry about that, because I really did enjoy his work up to that point in time.

Then … he started losing his mind in public, or maybe he just started showing publicly what had been going on privately all along (which I find likely). Today I listened to the latest leaked tape of a phone conversation with his most recent ex, and all I can really say is … the guy needs some psychological help. He also needs to be locked up somewhere for a while. Nut house, prison, doesn’t matter. He’s dangerous. Probably not to you, me, or any other normal person out here, but to his ex and their baby? Yes, I do believe he is a danger. If he wasn’t this insane before, he most certainly is completely off his rocker now, and there’s little room for doubt he’s an abusive asshole.

I’d say it’s sad, but it isn’t. What’s sad is that someone who seems to have the intelligence necessary to realize they need help, and has the resources to get the best help possible, doesn’t get help and instead lashes out at the world and their own loved ones. What’s sad is that his children, including the newest one, will grow up knowing their dad is the sort of person who would hit someone hard enough to break teeth when angry and threaten to kill the mother of one of his children, but … I suspect his other, older kids might already know more about that than any of us do. Being abusive to this degree doesn’t just manifest overnight. Who knows what happened in his first marriage.