Editors, Egos and Angst

It must be hell being a publication or in particular, a newspaper, editor. Despite the much vaunted (but practically impossible) notion of ‘editorial impartiality,’ you’re under the occasionally insidious but always omnipresent eye of the owners. You’re also under the rigorous scrutiny of a (God knows very small but discerning) percentage of your readers, along with Government, and your peers in the world of words. A tough, if sometimes not entirely undeserved karma. You walk the swaying tightrope between honest appraisal of influential figures, politicians and Kipling’s ‘common man’ and kissing their frequently ample backsides.

Regardless of the aspiration, there is actually no such thing as media impartiality. It’s either more or less partial to a particular individual or cause, but never without bias. Years ago, I wrote a marketing column for the then Weekly Mail and Guardian, under the editorship of now Caxton Professor of Journalism, Anton Harber. I discovered to my dismay that I could slag off Mangosuthu Buthelezi in my column and get a supportive flash on the front page of the newspaper. But when I tried to comment on the then Minister of Health, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma’s unwarranted interference in the size of health warnings on cigarette packs, I discovered she was ‘Royal Game’ to the newspaper, indeed one of the ‘untouchables.’ It was a shock. I had, in my naiveté, assumed that an editor would permit legitimate criticism of anyone – even if by one ‘misinformed’ but dissenting freelance columnist. Not so, it seemed.

What do you do when a media criticism-sensitive President Thabo Mbeki makes yet another long-winded and convoluted speech? Make like an Imbongi (praise-singer) in your editorial about it, because you may be excluded from some future governmental media scoop? What should your reaction be when the petulant and emotionally immature (because that’s what his behaviour explicitly spells out) Reserve Bank Governor, Tito Mboweni, perpetuates his vendetta of ‘exclusion’ against media owner and journalist Alec Hogg? On the tenuous grounds that Hogg once slighted him by querying his capacity? What does Mboweni expect in public office - media immunity? What makes Mboweni so special when the average Joe Citizen can have his life or character exposed in the relentless spotlight of media scrutiny? Mboweni needs to grow up and accept that public service cowboys don’t cry. Not in front of their horses, anyhow.

When you’re Peter Bruce, the editor of Business Day, how do you handle the death of an ANC icon like Walter Sisulu? If you don’t join the media masses (many trying really hard to be PC) beating their breasts and rending their clothing, you’ll be perceived as disrespectful or insensitive. But Business Day is a hard business news publication. The non-business media had already devoted reams of paper to Sisulu. Maybe he was worthy of all the attention. And maybe some of it was because editors were fearful of reader or market backlash to any perception of ‘inadequate’ respect. A hell of a position to be in, and Peter Bruce found himself in it. From Bruce’s excellent ‘mea culpa’ opinion piece on his conundrum, he thought in hindsight he’d done too little. I don’t think so. He’d maintained a dignified and in my opinion adequate balance between the positioning of his paper and the reportage on someone, who’s passing, we have to agree, didn’t have the slightest implication for either the economy or business. But look at the editorial angst that came with having to contemplate belly button lint on the issue.

In the present day Afrocentric mould, justified or not, criticism is ranked as the unpalatable if not unacceptable extreme opposite end of adoration. It creates bitter resentment within the ANC, to whom party unity is more important than any other issue. Just like loyalty is the obsession of George Dubya Bush, so it is to African politicos and functionaries. It’s become an endemic mindset and a desperately limiting one at that. In which any view not fitting the mould of common perception is dubbed adversarial, ‘colonialist’ (the new and McCarthyesque demonizing cuss word of Afro-politics) and therefore likely to have you or your publication marginalized or discriminated against.

The notion of genuine free speech is nonsense. There have always been and always will be, serious sociological or economic penalties attached to being honest and outspoken. It may indeed be true to say, as did the Bard, that “uneasy lies the head that wears the crown.” Equally true, would be the statement, “uneasy lies the head that guides the editorial hand, or the optical mouse.” 

Being economical with truth

According to the pundits, human personality comprises two facets: temperament and character. Temperament is regarded as the ‘fixed’ component. Character is changed by a multiplicity of variables around us throughout our lives. Character is essentially who we are and was emphasized by the great Hindu teacher, Swami Vivekananda, as the lynchpin of human development.

The slate we inherit at birth is by no means a blank. It’s etched, rather than written upon, with a variety of programs, acquired through our ancestry, genes and (I believe) karmic influences. What we add to it becomes a matter of choice. Some will select wise, future-investment-focused options. Others will choose short term ‘solutions’ and leave the future to take care of itself - which it has a peculiarly dreadful habit of doing. The phrase, ‘from bad to worse,’ springs to mind.

‘Motivational’ speakers are often the worst example of poor character development choices. I recently annoyed a good number of people by telling the inimitable Noeleen Maholwana Sangqu on her excellent TV show ‘3 Talk,’ that ninety percent of motivational speakers are frauds and charlatans. Why? Quite simply, as any of the very few honest travellers on the public speaking circuit will testify, most of them simply don’t live what they preach.

Case in point: One stood up in a workshop at which I was present. He told the people there that if they followed what he was recommending, “Your bank manager will come to you and say, ‘What do you want me to do with all of this money?’” What they didn’t know was that he’d been in my office a week earlier, asking for business referrals because his concept wasn’t working and he was in a financial bind.

If you’ve found something genuine and sustainable to pass on for the betterment of humankind, I believe it’s a divine obligation and privilege to do so. But in flogging a failure-guaranteed widget, simply because your ego is too big to acknowledge its flaws, I believe you’re committing active sin. Which is worse than the kind of sin where you’re not aware that what you’re doing is wrong. Conscious misleading of other people is lying.

Another of the motivational gurus talks about ‘respect for diversity’ and treating people with dignity. Yet backstage he verbally abuses and denigrates his support staff in the most cruel way. He’s charm in public and venom in private. Regretfully, he’s becoming the poster boy for inconsistency and a lack of congruence. Flying in the face of what a Zen master said, when asked what the most important thing was that he taught his disciples. He answered, “They should never preach what they practice, until they have practiced what they preach.”

One particular motivational speaker’s insensitivity beggars belief. I heard him this last weekend, tell a quadriplegic man that he should not allow himself to get ‘down.’ That the man had the power within himself to ‘create a miracle’ and that he was ‘lucky.’ Huh? It brought to mind an episode in the excellent TV series “Soul City” in which a disabled man challenged an able bodied person to get through just the daylight portion of one single day, in a wheelchair. The man failed to do so.

When asked by a caller on a TV show what she could do about pre-exam nerves, one young woman got this utterly useless woolly piece of advice from the guest ‘motivator’: “You can do it. You have it inside of you. Just go for it.” Profound.

This behaviour warp all comes back to character. Either you make up your mind to live your life honestly, or you adopt ‘weather vane’ morality. This means you stretch the truth and yield to the situational wind that buffets hardest. The only way to engage in sustainable ‘right living’ is to start living your script yourself, before you impose it on others. When it’s working for you, you’ll become a blessing to the planet. We should focus on fixing ourselves – not others. Another Zen saying is: “Become like a valley and all things will flow unto you.” When founded in integrity, our lives and initiatives always attract discerning audiences.

‘Terminological inexactitudes’ as Churchill referred to them, come from intrinsically dishonest people. Like Faust, they’ve sold their soul to ‘the Devil’ for some short term benefit. They’ve not carefully enough assessed the contract termination cost.  Some people have blurred the chalk line of truth so seriously, that they believe their own rhetoric. So, if like the few motivational speakers who haven’t quite reached that stage, we have a glimmering of conscience left, there’s hope for us yet. Let’s grab it quickly.