On Steve Jobs Film
Last night Don and I went to see “Jobs,” a film on the life of Steve Jobs, a man probably deserving to be canonized as chief saint of computerland. As the world knows, he has brought changes to our way of life. We wanted to find out what it was about the man that made him accomplish so much. As the film progressed, I began to be uncomfortable with what I was watching. If the film could be believed, this was a man obsessed with a purpose, a noble one, but somewhere along the way, the noble purpose took over the man.
“You have changed,” Steve Wozniak (portrayed by Josh Gad) said emotionally, “You are the beginning of your universe, and the end of your universe and it is a very small world.”
The character in the movie portrayed Jobs as visionary. He saw way into the future, very much ahead of the pack. And as he worked to bring his vision to reality, he let nothing get in the way of that process. He had to have absolute control. People became mere tools in his hands, and when he was done with them, he was done with them.
The Pursuit of Success
I have met people who are cut from the same cloth as Jobs has been portrayed. They, too, have climbed to great heights and in the eyes of many, have attained success. They are unfeeling, hardhearted and brutal in pursuit of their goals. I see people destroyed, hurt and broken in the wake of their quests. There have been tributes and accolades heaped on Steve Jobs for the impact he has made on our world. Rightly so. Probably, he would not have been able to do as much if he were less ruthless. I don’t know. I think there are many who would disagree with my discomfort about the manner Jobs accomplished his goals. Times have changed and paradigms have shifted. The old belief that the end does not justify the means has become passé to the younger generations. Years ago, seating in my journalism class, I listened intently to my professor, a well-known newspaperman, emphatically say, “Your responsibility is to get the news, the facts of the news by any way you possibly can.” Then he added, “You have to get the news, by hook or by crook.”
Lost Award-Winning Moment?
Why do we do what we do? What we do comes from who we are. Who and what we are come from the totality of what we bring with us when we are born and the experiences and influences that shape us. An influence on me came from a Reader’s Digest story I have read as a kid about a journalist/photographer covering the accidental death of a 3-year old girl. The girl had gone behind the truck her grandfather was driving. Unaware of her, the grandfather put his gear in reverse and backed up, running over his granddaughter. As he got out of his truck, he saw her, picked up her limp body and carried her into the house. By the time the photographer arrived at the residence, a group of neighbors and media people had gathered on the front lawn making it difficult for him to take pictures. He worked his way to the back of the house and found the kitchen door unlocked. He quietly opened the door and went in, but hesitated to take another step. Right in front of him was the picture of grief. The little girl’s body lay on the kitchen table with the grandfather seated next to her, his face buried in his hands. He recognized that the emotional scene before him presented an award-winning photo. He prepared his camera and as he started to work on its focus, he stopped, put back his camera in its case and quietly left the grieving grandfather with his granddaughter. Given the golden opportunity to shoot an award-winning picture, the photographer made the decision not to use another person’s grief to make a name for himself. He may not have become an award-winning photographer, and in fact, I don’t even remember his name, but as he shared this story many years ago, a little girl in a little city in the Philippines decided she would like to be the kind of person he was.
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