Making the Standards Stick

Celebrating Cronkite while ignoring what he did

As usual, Glenn Greenwald gets to the root of the issue. What made Walter Cronkite a legendary journalist and a man worth remembering was his understanding of the role that journalists should play in checking government behaviour and informing the people of what they need to know.

I have been writing since I was a little girl, and I had dreams of being a journalist -- writing hard-hitting accounts of current events and calling for action to preserve justice and our way of life. Or, sitting in front of a camera as did my hero, Edward R. Murrow, and cutting through the frippery to get to the heart of an issue. "What is right is not always popular; what is popular is not always right."

True journalism is not about being popular -- it is about being right.

Sadly, however, Greenwald has accurately surmised what is going to happen in the ongoing memorial to Walter Cronkite. After all, in order to show admiration for the man it is necessary for those who do what he despised to downplay the fact that he, in fact, despised it. Indeed, we have the dangerous habit of sugarcoating or plainly disregarding the truth when it is inconvenient, be it in our obsession with scandal and rumour rather than important world concerns or our slavish eulogizing of celebrities whose lives only gained meaning through the cult followings they gained.

So instead of a eulogy, I will take some important lessons from Uncle Walter: stand up for what is right, even if you are standing alone. Speak the truth, and shame the devil. Don't sell your honour or allow it to be taken from you. And whatever decisions you make with your life, make sure you can look yourself and all others in the eye at the end of the day.

Rest in peace, Uncle Walter.

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