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| SURVIVING THE UNABOMBER
David Gelernter survives a Unabomber attack and the press that covered it. November 4, 1997 |
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Questions asked
in this forum:
Does society wallow in victimhood? Has the incident changed your views of technology? Should journalists be judgmental? Can't the public determine the truth from the unbiased facts? How has writing helped you deal with the incident?
NewsHour Coverage
October 16, 1997
David Gergen speaks with David Gelernter about his book "Drawing Life: Surviving the Unabomber."
June 6, 1997
Is there a revolving door between journalism and politics?
April 7, 1997:
A discussion on the increasing mistrust of the press.
January 16, 1997:
A look at media ethics in the wake of the Food Lion case.
January 25-29, 1996:
A Gergen Dialogue and Authors' Corner forum with James Fallows, author of "Breaking the News: How the Media Undermined American Democracy."
Browse the NewsHour's coverage of media.
Outside Links
David Gelernter Web site
Two incidents shook up David Gelernter's world. The first occurred when he opened a small package that exploded, damaging his hearing, eyesight and blowing off part of his right hand.
The second incident occurred when Gelernter opened up a newspaper to find a column comparing his views on technology to those of the Unabomber, the man who committed the crime in a series of violent assaults on the field.
It's Gelernter's rage over this second incident that fuels his new book "Drawing Life: Surviving the Unabomber." Whether it's People magazine's decision to label the Unabomber one of the most fascinating people of the year, or News Weekly's choice to call him a "mad genius," Gelernter's book asserts that the coverage of the Unabomber underscores the severe problems crippling journalism today.
Gelernter, a professor of computer science at Yale University and writer for Time magazine himself, says the objectivity for which journalists pride themselves-- and prompts them to equally value the writings of a scholar and a murderer-- is moral craziness.
According to Gelernter, the press simply "trafficks" material without exercising moral judgement. The result? Journalists are ignoring-- perhaps crippling-- the natural social instinct to distinguish between right and wrong.
Is Gelernter right? Is journalism's claim of objectivity a front for morally irresponsible writing? Or is moral judgement the role of the reader, not the writer? After all, doesn't society demand non-biased reporting from the press?
David Gelernter will answer the following questions:
Does society wallow in victimhood?
Has the incident changed your views of technology? Should journalists be judgmental? Can't the public determine the truth from the unbiased facts? How has writing helped you deal with the incident?
In the NewsHour segment, you spoke about how the press pressured you to speak out on behalf of victims. Could you please elaborate? Where are these examples of society wallowing in victimhood? What's so wrong with providing comfort to others that have experienced similarly painful situations?
David Gelernter responds:
"Society is wallowing in victimhood" is an assertion like "it's cold in New Haven" (which it is); for many of us, it is a fact too obvious to need proof or elaboration, but in the end it's a subjective claim and if you're not cold, you're not cold.
I would begin, though, by noticing how often we use the word "victim." We're infatuated with it. (Check Nexis.) I would notice how we've attached huge dollars-and-cents value to victimhood. You see it in all sorts of ways, from outlandish jury awards to "victims" in tort cases through federal programs that steer government deals to wealthy black contractors (but not poor white ones) under affirmative action programs -- not because the black contractors do better work or lived harder or more admirable lives than anyone else, but on account of their belonging to an officially-recognized victim group. Feminists routinely describe women in general as "victims" (of sexism, patriarchy, etc.); if you sum up minorities plus women you arrive at a victim count that is well over half the population, and a lightbulb comes on suggesting that perhaps you've got a little carried away. This is a democracy and a free country, not to mention an extremely wealthy and powerful and privileged one; is it really conceivable that victims make up the greater part of the population?
I don't recall coming out against "providing comfort to others." My book goes on at length about various people who comforted me. Comforting the hurt and sick is a crucial religious obligation in Judaism and a moral obligation for everyone.
The important question isn't whether people should be comforted, but how. It was no comfort to me to be called a "victim" -- this is a matter of tact and common sense; I got comfort in exactly the opposite way, from people who pointed out not how I qualified as a victim but how I could count on transcending victimhood, leaving it in the dust as I got on with my life. (Whether I COULD transcend victimhood was THE vital question I faced in the hospital, as I suspect it is for many people under similar circumstances. The answer at that point wasn't obvious.)
Back to the top....
I heard somewhere that you don't have an all-embracing view of technology. Has the incident changed your views on technology?
David Gelernter responds:
No. I learned nothing about technology that I didn't already know. I doubt anyone else did either.
Back to the top....
Isn't absolute "good" and "evil" the stuff of fairy tales? Would you want to see journalists being judgmental about more difficult issues such as abortion or capital punishment?
David Gelernter responds:
No, it is the stuff of Judaism and Christianity. I'm a Jew, and as far as I'm concerned murder is evil (and stealing, lying, adultery and a bunch of other things are too). I don't know what you mean by "absolute" evil -- isn't just plain "evil" enough? If you mean "extreme evil," no one could possibly believe that "extreme evil" only exists in fairy tales -- and as far as I'm concerned, mailing bombs is an example. Perhaps you mean that no man is utterly without redeeming human qualities, or so evil that we can't conceive of his repenting; but I agree with both propositions (as I imagine nearly all religious people do), and I discuss them in the book.
I expect from a journalist exactly what I'd expect from a friend or colleague or neighbor, not that he agree with me on everything but that he and I speak the same moral language. If you believe that abortion is morally neutral or that capital punishment is unacceptable, I may disagree, but I don't doubt that a morally serious person could reach such positions. If you believe that murder is all right, that killing or injuring innocent strangers with mail bombs might be okay under the right circumstances, I have nothing to say to you. We have no moral common ground. You have a free-speech right to your opinions, and I don't question that right. I have a right to regard you as a monster, to regard your opinions as dangerous and unacceptable and to refuse to have anything to do with you. You might argue that rejecting abortion and accepting capital punishment were once part of our shared moral common ground in this country, and you'd be right. Society's moral consensus isn't fixed; it evolves. Has it evolved to a point where disapproval of murder, or terrorist bombing, is outside the moral consensus? God forbid -- though I don't doubt that if we continue the way we have, that could happen some day. At that point the group of people who are profoundly at odds with this society will be so great, the rest of the country will have to take notice (and for all I know, a new Mayflower will set sail).
Back to the top....
Don't you think the public can judge for themselves if something is "evil" or not after looking at unbiased facts?
David Gelernter responds:
Of course. But as far as I'm concerned, when you are dealing with a terrorist bomber there is nothing to judge. That's right: there is no leeway for disagreement. Some of us have got the idea nowadays that honest people can disagree about anything, but as I've said I reject that view. A Jew or Christian has to reject it.
Dennis Prager (the authority on Judaism, author and talk radio host) reported not long ago on a classroom where Hitler was under discussion. Everyone in the class agreed that, in his opinion, Hitler was evil. Not one student was willing to state that Hitler WAS evil, period, with no "in my opinion" about it; that if you disagreed, you were wrong. There is a moral catastrophe underway in that classroom.
Back to the top....
How has writing this book helped you deal with the Unabomber incident?
David Gelernter responds:
In part it's exactly what you'd expect: a man who gets angry wants to let people know, and feels better after he has. I wasn't angry about getting blown up per se -- these things happen, and I've always felt lucky to have survived and (for that matter) not to have been hurt worse. I WAS angry about one important, persistent strain in press coverage of the story. I've had my say -- and am still angry, but less angry. I guess.
But I would have written the book even if reporters had been uniformly lovely; in that case it would have been a simple narrative, which is what I had in mind originally. As I say in the book, a writer writes; it's a necessity like breathing, and it never occurred to me NOT to write the story down. One of my first conscious thoughts on coming to in the hospital was "I wonder how long till I can get to a word processor?" It was longer than I imagined, but I got there eventually.
DG
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