Teddy Roosevelt Calls Out Journalists for Being All Doom 'N' Gloom
- Lots of progress has been going on in the U.S. of A.
- A hundred years ago, the capital was just a bunch of trees and rocks. (Well actually, it was a kind of gross swamp called Foggy Bottom, but let's humor Teddy.)
- The fact that we have to build more government buildings now speaks to how fast America's moving as a whole.
- Rapid growth brings with it its own troubles. Namely, America's wealth hasn't really grown alongside its population, kind of like that shirt you swear fit last summer.
- While the material problems are way different than they were back in 1776, what isn't different is good old human nature and the timeless struggle between good and evil.
- Next Roosevelt mentions Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress. Remember that one, guys?
- It was the one about the guy who raked muck. (P.S. Muck = mud, or uh…manure.) He sure loved raking that muck. So much that he ignored the celestial crown above him and kept right on shoveling that muck.
- Mmm. Love that muck.
- Well, America has a lot of muck right now (metaphorically and literally, although we're speaking metaphorically here), and we need people to rake it.
- But, people who do nothing but wallow in corruption are a force of evil in the world.
- Don't get him wrong, Roosevelt love corruption-exposing journalists. Evil in every part of society should be exposed and torn down.
- The problem comes when, in attacking businesses, journalists lie.
- Roosevelt thinks lying's just as bad as stealing. Even if a guy is a jerk, spreading lies about him is still evil.
- Don't get him wrong, guys. He loves those journalists, really. Really-really. He doesn't want to whitewash the problems here; there are a lot of real problems and a lot of real sleazeballs.
- If people try to take an evil man down with slander, then people proving you wrong just make him look like a good guy who's being attacked unfairly. Either that or people hear your accusations so much that they just get tired of them.
- According to Teddy, journalists blowing things out of proportion makes a pretty nasty social climate, where honest people might not even want to enter the public sphere for fear of being smacked down.
- For example, Roosevelt was having trouble finding the right people to dig the Panama Canal, apparently because people, Congress included, were generally attacking those workers' characters.
- Like, reeeaally. He's all for punishing the guilty. Corrupt politicians, corporate grift, and everything needs to be stopped. But even if it is crime, if the crime is attacked in an underhanded way then it might do more harm than good.
- It's because he wants an all-out war against evil in the world that he wants that war to be fought well.
- If a journalist wallows in only news about corruption, then they're gonna get jaded about the whole business and stop being a force for good.
- If the whole system's seen as corrupt, then there's no way to point out people doing well within the system.
- If there are baseless attacks and broad condemnations everywhere, then people will become jaded. Why believe any news if a lot of it is just slander? Why do anything to fix the system if it's seen as broke beyond repair?
- The world doesn't need cynics like that. There is an army of problems in the world, but never before has there been more powerful forces for good in the world. It's important not to lose sight of that.