What the pen is not mightier than
Sometimes a simple phrase can capture the essence of an issue, boil it down and render it in a teaspoon of wisdom that is the catalyst for an ocean of prattle, postulation and pontificating.
While listening to a two-hour lecture from Sanford University on how the media is covering the current economic meltdown as I was mowing the lawn — not my usual rapid beat drums and bagpipe Highland marches to quicken the steps — a phrase stopped me in my tracks.
I ran back the recording and listened a couple of times. I got on the computer and searched out the source.
It was Diana Henriques, a senior financial writer at The New York Times, who had just described how she had worked in 2000 on this important story about some questionable lending practices, only to be roundly ignored by the regulators and apparently the public.
She said she and other reporters need to be more convincing. She urged journalists to “keep a sense of humility about the ability of the media to turn a powerful tide of public opinion.”
Then she said The Phrase: “It is true that the pen is mightier than the sword, but the pen is not mightier than a yawn.”
We can write day in and day out about the wrongs of the world, but if we cannot convince the public to act, it is all in vain.
To hear the crucial part go to minute-19:
