Noah and I are exchanging views. I shall summarize them here, but before I do so I must set the scene. We are at the dinner table, and Noah is sitting opposite me. The arrangement is one I favour.
Aesthetically, it is desirable. Full face, he is at his attractive best: in profile his face assumes the aspect of a police mugshot. I am not sure why, but I think it has something to do with his unkempt quiff and his ski-jump nose. Nothing to do with the chin, which is not weak or recessive a la Anglais. Our Noah is no nerd, thank heavens.
Practically, our juxtaposition has benefits too. He cannot place his hand on my knee nor slide it upwards towards what he regards as the City of Gold. A slithery hand, all serpentine and devious, gives me – what’s the word? – the willies. That is, if a hand can be a willy, which I suppose it can in a digital sort of way.
We are being earnest. No harm in that. Oscar Wilde, never forget, wrote a play about the importance of being earnest. Life may be a cabaret, old chum, but even cabaret can have its darker moments.
Prompting this earnest mood is Elon Musk. Actually, I misspeak. It is his interview with the editor of The Economist, which we have just watched on YouTube.
It is long, but riveting. In the course of viewing, I felt as I might after consuming a large packet of chocolate eclairs. Initially it was nice – well, quite nice anyway – then it made me queasy, and finally I began to wretch, no pleasant denouement. (Whence all the French, suddenly?)
Someone must be to blame, and it is not Elon. I am an admirer of the man, and not a secret one at that, but full-throated. I believe our boykie from Pretoria is the greatest South African since General Smuts. Nelson Mandela warrants a mention – he is an enduringly mentionable mensch – but he runs a poor third in my book.
I admire Musk not just for his exploits, but also for his integrity. He knows what he believes and, with a disarming smile, is not frightened to tell you what it is. He positively reeks of integrity. The fact that I share his views has nothing to do with my adulation, of course. I can be as intellectually dispassionate as the next man.
A cold shower
As you can see, I am sorely in need of a corrective, a cold shower if you like. I know as much, and it was in this spirit that I began watching the interview. I came away un-doused, and in this sense disappointed. Our boykie is even better than I thought. He says he speaks for the common man, and I agree. I regard myself as the common man, and he speaks for me. In common, it must be said, with quarter of a billion followers.
The same cannot be said of the interviewer, who is (as I said) the editor of The Economist. Her full name is a mouthful – Susan Jean Elisabeth Minton Beddoes – that denotes an aristocratic background much in the style of royal soubriquets.
What she also shares with royalty is an affection for nicknames. Hers is ‘Zanny’. Fair enough. You can’t live your life constantly being addressed by names that number five. It is neither convenient nor democratic.
My understanding of an interview intended for airing is that it takes one of two forms. It can be face to face, in which case the interviewer asks questions and the interviewee responds; or it confronts interlocutors with each other and invites them, duly moderated, to exchange views.
In neither role is the interviewer expected to present his own views. He can be as savage as he wished – witness Jeremy Paxman – but never must he descend and become a protagonist. He is an interrogator, no more and no less.
There is a very good reason for this. If the presenter bandies words with the interviewee, he surrenders the impartiality with which his role cloaks him. He also foists on us his views when they are neither sought nor desired.
Failed to do so
Zanny should have understood as much. If she failed to do so, her sidekicks should surely have instructed her during the inevitable pre-interview briefings and rehearsals. But no, not our Zanny. Used, no doubt, to holding forth at editorial meetings, she chose to deploy the same technique in now dealing with Musk. She opined, she evaluated, she judged, and she professed.
Abandoning every vestige of impartiality, she told Musk that a lot of people hated him. “No doubt,” he said, “but many more hate you and your sort.” To which she could do nowt but grimace. The standing of journalists has never been lower. Our Zanny is emblematic of the problem.
Truth be told, the standing has never been very high. We have only to read Trollope’s Barchester Towers to see that it was dismal even in Victorian England. As someone once quipped:
“You cannot hope to bribe or twist
(thank God!) the British journalist.
But, seeing what the man will do
unbribed, there’s no occasion to.”
The views of the writer are not necessarily the views of the Daily Friend or the IRR.
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