George Takei’s Facebook Mea Culpa: ‘So What?’

News tonight that George Takei’s Facebook page — consistently virally popular and well-shared — had been at least in part populated with content by a ghostwriter sent mild ripples across the social media sphere.

But George Takei’s Facebook mea culpa is much in line with the character we’ve all grown to love on Facebook, and it seems that the brewing “scandal” won’t hurt the Star Trek and social media star so much simply in part because the voice in which he answered the questions is the same we’ve gotten used to on his page.

In essence, if George Takei’s Facebook is ghostwritten, the ghostwriter seems to capture Takei to a pretty decent T.

And following on from that, Takei’s page, which we imagine is in part cultivated by the star, is no more “fake” than a lot of our pages.

Sure, maybe we don’t pay ten bucks a joke like George allegedly does, but at the end of the day, we all don’t present a real-life stream on the social network.

No matter your persona, we all cobble together bits of information to create a PR front, amateur as it may be. Like George Takei on Facebook, we too share links (look how much I know and care about stuff!), images (am I a funny lady or what?), selected life events (no, take another one, that’s chin city!), and even gripes (I hate it when people do thing this afternoon but I’m not going to tell them directly.)

While social media is all about authenticity, ostensibly, and the George Takei Facebook revelation strikes that down to a degree, we’re all complicit in the curating and the positioning and the creating a persona to impress and satisfy friends, lovers, acquaintances and co-workers.

Ultimately, the George Takei Facebook page is George Takei to Facebookers, and that’s probably all that matters.

Takei himself was unbothered by the admission, and said:

“What is this hoo-ha about my FB posts? I have Brad, my husband, to help me and interns to assist. What is important is the reliability of my posts being there to greet my fans with a smile or a giggle every morning. That’s how we keep on growing.”

Takei adds:

“The commentaries are mine … They are authentically mine, I assure you.”

We have to say, we agree with George Takei’s Facebook view — it’s not really about a raw direct stream when you seek to connect with people on the service, it’s more about a well timed and targeted way to speak to your friends to the best of your ability — and sometimes, we all enlist help. (When was the last time you made your own meme? Never?)

As the George Takei Facebook scandal resonates web-wide, we are pretty confident in guessing it won’t hurt the social media star one bit, nor should it.