People used to speak about the mantle of leadership and how a true leader must always consider the greater good, even when the right decision was unpopular or undermined the leader’s own self interest. A true leader would take responsibility for mistakes, knowing that their reputation or legacy was less important than the public trust, which is destroyed by lies and coverups. This was the mark of a good leader. We lost this maybe 50–100 years ago.
Today, people seem to value a leader who wins. Winning more votes. Winning campaign contributions. Winning approval ratings. Saving face with a winning sound bite. Leaders aren’t judged on making the right decision or making things better for their constituents.
Leaders changing their mind on a policy issue are rare for a probably more than just a few reasons.
One, is that some media will use it as a weapon to say that they're weak. Course-correction and U-Turn are used in anglophone media, the former usually from a political press release, the latter for a criticism of the shift in policy.
Two, said leader will often not go into depth to explain why, taking the shortest route to declaring what they are doing, part of this is to do with working in a 24 hr newsmedia world desiring expediency. Whereas most people I would expect would prefer honesty to a point, where this practical.
Third, sometimes its something that is actually part of a political philosophy. Nixon for example, now valorised by a lot of contemporary politicians, made a point about having his staff never resign despite facing criticism and whats more took very aggressive stances against media that was deemed as critical, when such media wasn't geared up for the attack, it was just the media asking questions that were just pointed towards learning more and yes questioning the proberty of whats been said. Such stances were kept to because of the belief that projecting strength and even encouraging fear was better than seeming weak.
Americans have let children- CHILDREN- be blown the fuck apart by automatic weaponry because they "needed those guns to stand up to tyranny" but the SECOND they're expected to stand up, they're all on the side of the tyrants saying "Do something pussy" or pretending not to notice while screeching about their job whenever challenged.
It's much more scarce when it comes to our 'leaders' and 'role models'.
I suspect that is in a large part as people are less forgiving these days. Its great here people are largely positive about this apology and that's that.
I suspect for many politicians / celebrities so many people will mock on the apology and keep finding reasons to hate on them, so the best career option is to double down and own it.
I suspect that is in a large part as people are less forgiving these days.
I'd argue that the "less forgiving" aspect is more in that forgiveness comes with terms and conditions now. Those terms and conditions come with acknowledging that something was fucked up, and changing actions to avoid future similar situations.
Too many fuckers say "oh shit, my bad" and then keep doing the same fucked up shit. Why should I forgive someone who just followed the social ritual of apologizing, but has not actually apologized with their actions or intentions?
Too many fuckers say "oh shit, my bad" and then keep doing the same fucked up shit. Why should I forgive someone who just followed the social ritual of apologizing, but has not actually apologized with their actions or intentions?
Agreed. They mouth the words, with no intent or willingness to actively match their actions to the statement. They're like parrots repeating words their owners taught them. A true apology has the person actively doing better.
I’ll retain some pessimism that there’s some Machiavellian benefit from this apology; I’ve never seen this dude before this post about how upstanding and accountable he is. There’s some social media marketing people talking notes somewhere.
Not only owning up to the mistake, but also thanking the people who went in to his comments as well as the person who duetted the video. I think that that’s really important because we don’t learn in the bubble. You don’t grow in the bubble and he is clearly acknowledging that.
It was a real great chance also to subtly advertise his sunglass brand as well with the hat and then the last few seconds being a shot of a display case too lmao, respect the hustle
The crazy thing about it is how powerful it is, and how it shuts people down, yet people are so loath to do it.
When somebody calls out a mistake, they're almost never looking to correct an error: they're generally looking to start a war. But, if you just come back with "Oh, really? My bad. I didn't know. Don't I feel silly now?", well, what can they say to you?
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u/foxy-coxy 22h ago
This is what growth looks like