Feb 25, 2026
“It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself in a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat.”
—Theodore Roosevelt, Paris, April 23, 1910
Have you noticed how casually we have accepted the presence of intermediaries between the producer and consumer; between dreamer and do-er?
This has been a timeless part of commerce. We acknowledge and appreciate the role of a real estate agent, newspaper editor, shopkeeper, and chef, as examples. But thanks to social media, there has been a rise in the number of people who, while contributing nothing, tell us what we are supposed to think.
They include:
-random people who sit in their cars comparing hamburgers
-ranters rating pizzas on the sidewalk
-algorithm coders
-denizens of Yelp, Squish, Blab, Blurb, Baloney, and other online review sites
Not a single one of them has ever created any of the products they are judging. So why and when did we farm out our opinions?
I admit that I participate in third-party opinionating. When I am making a purchase, I reflexively head to the feedback section. These are usually based on 1 to 5 stars. I always first click on the 3-star ratings. Why? Because I know this will be the fairest review. The 5-Stars are suspiciously similar in their wording, so that I suspect they are planted there by the product manufacturer. The 1-Star reviews are written by generally unhappy people, who build their sense of esteem by trashing any product, often for silly and unrelated issues such as “the picture showed canary yellow and it was saffron yellow.”
But I don’t know why we watch someone sitting in their car comparing a name-brand candy bar to a store brand candy bar. Or dissecting a hamburger for views. The repercussions go beyond how many pickles sit on your buns.
Paradoxically, social media has enabled previously powerless individuals to do an end run around national filter when it comes to politics. Many of us grew up listening to the Big 3 evening news anchors tell us everything they thought we needed to hear about our presidents, from the conflicts around the world, through various “gates,” to the “faux pas du jour” such as the spelling of potato.
What I eventually realized was that the image of a president formed in my head from listening to the news reports did not match my impression of the president when we were able to hear him speak in his own words. Even on the rare occasion the public could view the unfiltered messages, such as the State of the Union, it was immediately followed by the “experts,” telling us what to think.
So what?
The late Mark Hierholzer, the talented and thoughtful pianist and composer, told me of being approached by an audience member after a concert and being asked, “Well, what am I supposed to think about that?” He was appalled that anyone didn’t have the confidence to form their own opinion on a personal reaction to art.
The reason, of course, is that we have grown comfortable being guided by strangers.