truthtelling in America

The father of sociology, Herbert Spencer, who coined the phrase “survival of the fittest,” has been greatly misunderstood as a social Darwinist, claims a new biography. Carl Rollyson, writing in the New York Sun, explains:

The clinching scene of this intellectual biography is Spencer’s appearance at Delmonico’s, the famous New York City restaurant, where, on November 9, 1882, 200 of his admirers gathered to honor Spencer with a farewell banquet capping off his only American tour. Spencer told his American acolytes there was too much emphasis on the “gospel of work” — a direct blow to [his fan Andrew] Carnegie and his ilk. Now it was time, he said, to emphasize the “gospel of relaxation.”

The audience was in a state of shock, but Spencer was not attempting to be provocative. He had come to believe that overwork had ruined his own constitution, and that the evolutionary progress he believed in should lead to a world where people worked less and lived for pleasure, especially aesthetic enjoyment.

Hear, hear! So why was the audience shocked?

… Spencer saw an opportunity to level with sympathetic listeners. Or as Mr. Francis puts it, “Since he was addressing Americans, who he had mistakenly assumed liked to hear the truth, he had spoken more plainly than usual.” [e.a.]

Yes, that’s a mistake many made before Spencer, and that many make every day.

No one likes to hear the “awful truth, which hurts.” Billy Wilder said that about moviegoers. And we are all moviegoers.