So It Goes

Enabling Bigotry

ON ONE LEVEL, I've never understood what everyone sees in Don Imus. His speech is often incoherent (how did a guy with such bad articulation make it in radio?). He just sort of introduces segments, tries to crack lame jokes, plays some a few songs now and then goes to commercials.

Still, he apparently has a huge following. I don't have any Arbitron ratings in front of me, but there's a reason that big-time politicians and other media notables flock to his show. He offers them a megaphone to a vast audience. And it's not just any audience but a Middle American demographic that most of those pols and gliterati can't reach through C-SPAN, NPR and PBS. That's power.

Which is obviously why so many rather shrugged off Imus's remarks last week about Rutgers University athletes being “nappy-headed ho’s.”

Al Sharpton, naturally shot back, and this time he was right, telling the Associated Press, “I accept his apology, just as I want his bosses to accept his resignation.”

Today, Imus's bosses -- NBC and CBS, both of which carry his show on TV and radio -- took a pretty big step in that direction and suspended him for two weeks. That's a strong and appropriate signal, I think. Probably long overdue, as it's not the first time Imus has spouted off with such racial invective.

If only regular Imus guests like Tom Oliphant of the Boston Globe and Evan Thomas of Newsweek saw it the same way. As David Carr reported in today's New York Times: “'Whatever problem there was, I think that he [Imus] took care of with his statement of Friday,' said Mr. Oliphant, one of the guests scheduled for this morning. 'It was classic Imus. He said he screwed up and he was sorry. Bang. Bang. It was very much to the point, and did not offer any excuses.'...'He should not have said what he said, obviously,' said Mr. Thomas of Newsweek. “I am going on the show, though. I think if I didn’t, it would be posturing. I have been going on the show for quite some time and he occasionally goes over the line.'”

Oh, don't mind him, they're saying, he's harmless. Besides, his audience is so huge, we can't afford to turn our backs on them. What would it mean for our careers? Why else would these guys, truly accomplished, thoughtful and respectful journalists, be wasting their time with an incoherent, racist guy?

It reminds me of all the equivocating we heard from equally thoughtful and respectful guys like them (such as Michael Kinsley, who I otherwise think the world of) when everyone suddenly began to realize that Patrick Buchanan's had, shall we say, some problems with Jews and non-Anglo immigrants and tried his best to fuel a nasty "culture war" along religious, racial and ethnic lines. He's a nice guy, a little feisty, maybe, but we need him for balance, said those who defended his prominent positions on CNN, not to mention his widely syndicated columns.

The truth was he was way beyond the pale of acceptable civil discourse, and the only reason he wasn't drummed out of his powerful media perches by voices of reason sooner was because he was good TV, good copy, and that means good ratings, good sales.

And that's how a guy of like Imus, who offers so little in the way of substance and even, forgive my snootiness, entertainment value, can be enabled for so long. People look the other way. They take what they can get from him and laugh off his "eccentricities." It's good for once that his bosses have not looked the other way, though I suspect they did it this time only because the pain was too severe.

I wonder if Evan Thomas thinks they're just "posturing."

Jeff

Another Jerk: What Will We Learn from Judith Regan?

I DON'T KNOW JUDITH REGAN PERSONALLY, so I'm certainly in no position to judge her character, or, as our President has claimed to have accomplished in his first meeting with Vladimir Putin, to look into her eyes and to know her true soul. (Bush sure go that one right, eh?)

The media accounts, which are all I have to go on, suggest that Regan may have uttered something in private that was anti-Semitic. At best, she said something that was garbled in the translation. At worst, she has problems with Jews. A story about her on National Public Radio revealed reports that, among other things, she once boasted about replacing the sacred parchments inside of her neighbors' mezuzahs, those small prayer holders Jews put on the doorposts of their homes, with torn dollar bills.

Whether all of this is true, I can't verify, and whether it suggests terribly warped mind or real animous for Jews, many of whom must surely be a big part of her personal and professional life, I really can't say. If it is true, obviously, she deserves all the condemnation that has rained down on her over the last few weeks.

But even if it's not, my question is this: what took the publishing world and the people around her so long to run her out of her powerful perch? By all accounts -- and there seems to be absolutely no disagreement about this -- she's a despicable human being, who treats everyone around her terribly. Indeed, she seems to be a legendary abuser. Writing in today's San Francisco Chronicle about how the "foul-mouthed" Regan changed publishing for the better, of all things, Steve Kettmann also reported that she burned through employees rapidly because of her offensive style. "Another former Regan Books editor told me that according to News Corp. financial statements, Judith went through 80 employees just in the last year -- including 18 personal assistants," Kettmann wrote.

What finally got her fired from her parent company, HarperCollins, was not this reputation for chewing up people and spitting them out or other infamous indiscretions, which she apparently did not deny or shrink from. It was, rather, bad publicity that went far beyond even bad taste. It was the news that the Regan imprint would publish the O.J. Simpson book "If I Did It." There was, as most people know from the the barrage of cable news coverage, a firestorm of controversy about the book, and the publishers withdrew it for sale. HarperCollins subsequently fired Regan in the aftermath.

Again, I am hardly privvy to what was behind that decision, but one must ask the question, why now? Regan's behavior had been outrageous and well known for years. So, too, many of her books, as Kettmann points out, exploited the sensational, even seamy aspects of American society and current events.

One, for example, was the Jose Canseco memoir, which many argued played fast and loose with the facts about steriod use in Major League Baseball (though Canseco himself courageously came clean and the book was a catalyst, one might argue, for a lot of progress in baseball on this issue since). Her other authors have included Rush Limbaugh and Howard Stern, professional wrestler Mick Foley, and porn star Jenna Jameson. Hardly America's literary heritage.

Kettmann says that this sort of roster has been a Regan's great contribution to the publishing world. "'I think publishing learned from her that you have to appeal to the masses,' said one former Regan Books editor. 'Enough of being too high-brow. She was the one who said yes to wrestling when everybody was turning their noses up at it. Bang, No. 1. She had an ear to the ground and it worked for a long time.'"

Maybe. I won't enter this high-brow vs. low-brow debate. Perhaps Regan did have a gift for this, and, say what you want about how degenerate this stuff is; people bought it in large quantities.

So as long as Regan's horses kept winning, her bad behavior and schlocky "literature" didn't matter. Not to the people above her who, it turns out, truly had the power to put her out of the business at any moment, or the people below her, who kept coming back for more -- like the acolytes of Miranda Priestly, the "Devil Wears Prada" character based on the notoriously abusive real-life editor of Vogue magazine, Anna Wintour.

In all these cases, and the ones I mentioned in a much earlier posting on jerks about the famously undiplomatic diplomat John Bolton, there is an unfortunate game in which everyone ignores the most obvious personality flaws of the one in charge. There is a tacit acknowledgement that bad behavior counts for very little, or maybe even nothing, as long as the cash cow, whatever that is in an organization or industry, lives. As soon as the cow swoons and dies, the character flaws suddenly become apparent. People are shocked, shocked, to learn about them.

But the fact is that bad behavior matters, and it ought to be taken into account before it's much too late and before we find ourselves making excuses for overlooking it. We can blame the abuser, but the rest of us who allow him or her to act badly bear responsibility, too.

The sad thing is that Judith Regan will probably survive this episode just fine, and even do much better than she did before in some enterprise, whether it's publishing, her own talk show, movie producing, a line or make-up or who knows what. We have a way of forgiving famous people for their slip ups (except maybe O.J. and the Saddam Hussein), even when they don't undergo substantial character change.

It will be interesting to see if Regan changes, if she learns anything from this and puts her flaws behind her. But it will be much more interesting to see if the rest of us do, too.

Jeff

The Devil Is a Jerk

A COUPLE OF WEEKS AGO, my family wanted to see the movie "The Devil Wears Prada," even though I really didn't want to (not the first great sacrifice I have made for my family). I had read some lukewarm-to-bad reviews and really don't care about what appeared to be a foofy profile of the fashion industry, something I care about even less.

But I misjudged. Not that it was one of the greatest triumphs in the history of filmmaking. In fact, the story was fairly formula. About 15 minutes into it, you could predict with near precision pretty much where it was going to go.

Other than Meryl Streep, who delivered a masterful performance (I truly could not wait for her next entrance and wished that she would never leave any scene), all the  other actors were appealing and carried out their roles about as well as the script would allow. (Not surprisingly, the exception was Stanley Tucci as Streep's loyal henchman, who took his role a lot further, I suspect, than even his script writers could have imagined. His character revealed a tender, independent interior aching to break out of a brutal, up-tight exterior.)

But what really grabbed me about this film was what it said about the working world. Streep's character, Miranda Priestly, based on the editor of Vogue magazine, Anna Wintour, is miserable, sadistic and manipulative  to everyone around her: not only to the subordinates who report to her, whom she seems to delight in putting through her equivalent of Marine boot-camp humiliation tactics, but also: fashion designers, who would kill to have a mention of their lines on her pages; would-be challengers to her throne; her husband; and her own publisher, the only one who, other than God (if she believes she is not the deity herself), to whom she is theoretically answerable.

She runs her powerful kingdom -- and it is powerful, shaping the fortunes of businesses and tastes of millions -- through fear and intimidation. And, as played by Streep, she does it without ever raising her voice and sometimes through a mere pursing of her lips or other cryptic signals that everyone is required to understand.

What's amazing to me is how all these people jump to her every command -- whether it has to do with the serious business of the next issue of the magazine or to the peculiar way she likes her cappucinos. And, God forbid, anyone should slip up, or she will bring down her wrath upon them.

I was discussing this with a colleague at work yesterday who had seen the movie four times already (she loved looking at the clothes, she said). Even if this an exaggeration of what the real Anna Wintour is like (and the word is, it's not, but, in fairness to Ms. Wintour, I'm not relying on first hand information), I said that it's a pretty sad state of affairs. And, I said, how is it possible that Vogue is still able to put out what every has to agree is a good product given its culture of fear and intimidation -- let alone, from my vantage point, clownish snootiness?

Well, my colleague argued (though she wasn't defending Wintour or Streep's Priestly but rather playing devil-wears-Prada advocate), maybe the nastiness only extends as far as Wintour's immediate circle.

But, I countered, my experience is that the person at the top tends to set a tone in an organization's culture, and if that leader shows all the managers down the line that this kind of behavior is okay, they will feel safe in behaving the same way. I don't want to take this comparison too far, but, hey, how do you think so many in fascist societies feel free to carry out hideous atrocities and other garden-variety indignities on their fellow citizens? Because they know they can do so with impunity and, indeed, might even be affirmatively rewarded for acting that way.

What's more, doesn't it seem natural that, when hiring others, a leader will look for qualities that he or she likes in himself or herself? If that's the case, who do you think will populate those upper-tier and middle management positions?

Also, I said, how could putting people under such perverse pressure bring out their best and get them to perform well? My colleague answered that in an environment like that people know that if they don't perform well they can be replaced easily. "There are thousands of others who would die to have your job," Streep keeps saying.

And that's probably true. And it's probably true that there are many supremely talented people who are willing to put up with these sorts humiliations to practice their craft at a place like Vogue, which will be their ticket to admission into virtually any other design, editing or photography job anyplace else -- if they can just stick it out long enough at Vogue.

But if they are dying to get out almost as much as they are dying to get in, what's that say about the place? If they perform to spite their boss not because of her leadership, vision and encourgement, how good could that be for the finished product, really? And doesn't that mean that the success of the place balances precariously on a weak foundation that would take only a good, well-focused competitor to undermine?

The exhibit I have in my argument is that I happen to work at a place that is about as opposite as one can get to the kind of environment portrayed in "The Devil Wears Prada," and I can say without any hyperbole that my firm is one of the best performing in its class. People around the industry -- clients and competitors -- acknowledge this, and many of my colleagues who have worked in other firms say ours is one of the most collegial environments they've been in. I think that, not fear and intimidation, is what brings out the best in us and makes us succeed.

As I said in an earlier blog about jerks, bad behavior ought to be a factor when leaders are selected. But, sadly, it's usually overlooked or rationalized ("he's so brilliant," "she's a genius, you know," "he's a very good fundraiser," "I'm not sure what we would do without her,"... ), even when it's obvious and unbearable to everyone. (My experience is that the people who have the real power to remove a jerky leader, his or her superiors, are the ones who who are least likely to bear the brunt of his or her antics, even if they're aware of them, which is why these problems never gets addressed and the underlings keep taking their hits or just keep quitting).

If enough of us would just stop playing along with them and indulging their jerkiness, we could put them in their place -- far from the corner offices and positions of authority where I think they do more damage than good.

Jeff

Jerks

About 15 or 16 years ago, I attended a fundraising dinner honoring a prominent businessman. It was, by every normal measure, a resoundingly successful event. I remember there were upwards of 1,500 people there, nearly all of them business associates beholden to the honoree in one way or another, so much so that they were willing to pay a premium to be in his presence.

Tributes to this captain of industry flowed generously from the official rostrum. But at the tables and in the lobby, attendees were trading stories illustrating how detestable a person this honoree was. Hardly a person who knew him, professionally or otherwise, could deny that he could be verbally abusive, self-absorbed, vindictive and generally unpleasant.

Everyone involved with the organization of this event knew of these not-so-wonderful traits; it would be hard not to know. But he had had a truly transformative impact on his industry, not to mention on the fortunes of many of the people at the dinner. In spite of his temperamental flaws, he was able to pack the ballroom. All for a good cause.

I mention this by way of recalling that at about this time last year the political leaders of this country did something we rarely see: they actually took into account the bad behavior of a candidate for a public office.

I’m referring to John Bolton (left), who, according to pretty much everyone (though I can’t confirm this firsthand, of course), was reputed to have a tempestuous personality. He was prone to shouting at, belittling and threatening colleagues, particularly subordinates; in one case, he directed his wrath at a career intelligence officer at the State Department who refused to bend what he knew to be true to fit  Bolton’s ideological agenda. At a certain point during the debate around Bolton’s nomination to be U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, even many of his Republican supporters conceded that he was not Mr. Congeniality. His confirmation stalled in the Senate, and the White House, ever afraid to appear afraid of criticism, pushed his nomination through in a recess appointment. It remains to be seen whether  Bolton will make it back to the U.N. when that appointment expires.

What’s so disappointing about that episode was how rare it was. Too infrequently does bad behavior trump other character traits.

We can all cite examples of the men and women who are revered in their communities (or by whole nations) for their genius, and even for their humanity and unselfish service to the public, but who are also well-known for their hot tempers, for brow beating effectively defenseless underlings and for otherwise making life miserable for all within their orbit.

Why doesn’t this count? Why, when we assess a person’s worth, does personality usually figure so low in the calculus, unless of course that person’s contributions are meager in other ways that do "count?" And why are these people so often rewarded with top jobs, where they terrorize subordinates and do damage to the organizations they are supposed to be serving?

That’s why, leaving aside what you think of his philosophy and his politics, and of the fact that the White House essentially ignored all the appeals to civility, the debate about John Bolton was an unusually bright moment in our national discourse. For once we openly acknowledged what everyone was whispering out in the hallway. For once something that can have a debilitating effect on organizations and certainly within households is raised to its proper level of importance. For once we noted that being a jerk is as much an impediment to job performance (particularly one that requires diplomacy) and to one’s contributions to society as anything else.

How self righteous I am, you may say. Fair enough. I admit that it can be hard to judge, let alone forge much consensus around, when a person’s behavior is truly beyond the pale. You can always find some people who will defend those actions and others who will account for the cirumstantial evidence.

And while I consider myself a nice guy most of the time, I, like anyone else, have my assholic moments. Also, I must confess that my own job benefitted from that fundraiser I attend 15 or 16 years ago. So maybe I, too, in some way rationalized what happened there because it was too inconvenient to do otherwise. I understand this isn't simple.

But I’m talking about people who have clearly and chronically passed an admittedly hazy line of what’s nice and what’s not. I'm talking about the equivalent of regularly and with impunity going 70 in a 40 mile-per-hour speed zone and weaving recklessly across lanes, while most of the rest of us are generally following the rules but only occasionally going 10 or 15 miles over the limit.

I’m happy to say that behavior can count for something if people resolve to make it count. I’ve noticed that in my current workplace, prima donnas and those who generally don’t play well with others don’t fit in well and tend not to stay long –- or if they do, they find their roles marginalized because nobody wants to work with them. There seems to be an unspoken, but I think consciously formed, ethic that no one should be forced to suffer such colleagues, and the truth is it just gets in the way of our doing a good job. Maybe that’s why my office leadership has created and maintained that culture. I think it's no coincidence that we're also a successful business.

This just in. As I was finishing this entry, my wife and daughter emerged from the TV room to report that Harold Dieterle (left) had won the title of America's Top Chef, Bravo Channel’s culinary answer to American Idol. His championship round competitor was Tiffani Faison, who everyone on the show (of course, the show’s producers loved to incite and make much of the snippy fights between the contestants) agreed could qualify as America’s Top Jerk, even if her cooking was great. The audience, which was allowed to vote for the winner, overwhelmingly picked Harold, who was more widely liked as a person and respected as a chef.

There’s hope.

Jeff