Every moment dies a man
Mr. Rogers died today; he was 74.
Very frankly, I am opposed to people being programmed by others. My whole approach in broadcasting has always been "You are an important person just the way you are. You can make healthy decisions." Maybe I'm going on too long, but I just feel that anything that allows a person to be more active in the control of his or her life, in a healthy way, is important.(Fred Rogers, March 20, 1928-February 27, 2003, quoted in Sony Corp. of America v. Universal City Studios, 464 U.S. 417, 445 (1984), n. 27 (citations omitted))
I've long wondered what he meant by his proviso "in a healthy way"; I ought to have written to ask him. It reminds me of Locke's proviso:
Whatsoever, then, he removes out of the state that Nature hath provided and left it in, he hath mixed his labour with it, and joined to it something that is his own, and thereby makes it his property. It being by him removed from the common state Nature placed it in, it hath by this labour something annexed to it that excludes the common right of other men. For this "labour" being the unquestionable property of the labourer, no man but he can have a right to what that is once joined to, at least where there is enough, and as good left in common for others.(John Locke, Second Treatise of Government, para. 26)
What they have in common is that it's very easy to remember the general statement and to forget about the proviso or qualification. For Mr. Rogers, it was "in a healthy way"; for Locke, it was "where there is enough, and as good left in common for others". It's hard to imagine that either man would have wanted us to pass idly by his qualification. To Mr. Rogers, "in a healthy way" would surely have been a central part of his message.
I remember when Mr. Rogers ate some tapioca pudding on his show, because one of his neighbors had shared it with him. I was really jealous because Mr. Rogers got to have tapioca pudding, and I (at home) didn't get any. I thought Mr. Rogers was really lucky to have such friendly neighbors who wanted to give him tapioca pudding. But he was lucky in more ways than that; he was lucky to have the opportunity to help interpret the world to generations of young people.
Another time he asked his cameraman to turn the camera around and show us the studio (with its lights, cameras, scaffolding, and staff members). That was a shock; it was fascinating and horrifying; it was generous and courageous; it was a frame-breaking experience which set me up to enjoy Hofstadter and, maybe, in a small way, to weather other disillusionments.
I once wrote a fan letter to Mr. Rogers (long before I'd heard of the Betamax doctrine or knew that I had him to thank for it). I drew him a terrible picture of a fish and told him that I loved his show. He wrote back, thanking me effusively, and included a drawing of his own (a caboose, if I remember correctly, drawn with somewhat greater artistic skill).
Now sweatered Rogers, each and every day,
Was kind and gentle -- "in a healthy way".
He'll come no more on the T.V.:
Timor mortis conturbat me.
We'll miss you, Mr. Rogers.
