Although most of us can’t live without our phones anymore and spend many hours on social media, society (on a global scale) seems to become less social in the real world. Tolerance towards others seems to continue to decline. People more and more seem to be only interested in something when it is shocking or when someone is talked down to. Maybe it is because I am getting older, but I have the feeling that people complain more easily and are able to be heard (even go viral with it). Negativity seems to dominate. When you keep that in the back of your mind when watching the documentary Won’t You Be My Neighbor?, this might be something to inspire.
Fred Rogers, who I had never heard of living in the Netherlands, was very successful with his show Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood. Starting in 1968, he made no less than 895 episodes and director Morgan Neville (who previously made the Oscar winning documentary Twenty Feet from Stardom) focuses on Rogers’ career and the impact he had with his program. A show that was different and relatively slow. Yet he was very progressive with it and brought up various topics, including discrimination and the assassination attempt on Robert Kennedy. It allowed kids to understand more complicated things in the world. He was a man who was talented (he not only wrote the show, but also composed the music for it) and sincere. He made a connection with his youthful audience and took the time for everyone. His goal was to make everyone feel good about who they were. There is a moment in the documentary in which he has to appear before Congress to convince a group that the state should finance a television channel. Rogers speaks from a very pure place in his heart and immediately convinces his listener. A reaction that you probably would not see anywhere anymore, with people constantly aware of how others will judge them or making themselves look better.
Even you haven’t got a clue who Rogers was, Won’t You Be My Neighbor? is a must-see. It shows what you can accomplice by being socially involved, how you can change people’s minds by doing this differently. A glimmer of hope that society could be different, packaged in the form of a documentary.
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