Office Politics
Back in the late 2000’s, a pop culture figure made a greater name for himself by starring in a network TV series where he regularly annoyed, bullied, and harassed his associates. This character was so self-unaware that he assumed everyone adored him, many wanted to sleep with him — or at least go out with him — and that he was a sensitive, caring boss.
Still, everything that happened within his immediate space was about him, according to him.
He considers himself a cross between a superstar basketball player, a rogue spy, an expert on multiculturalism, a master of improvisation, a respected leader, and someone imminently worthy of the high office he has somehow attained. He has no idea what people really think of him, little insight into why they might find him foolish, naive, insensitive, disloyal, childish, egocentric, and as one of his colleagues so indubitably put it, “a real jerk.”
This character never seems to work; he doesn’t read anything even if it’s addressed to him. Yes, he’s a sharp dresser, if you go in for that sort of thing, and there are doubtlessly reasons as to why he believes himself to be above everyone else, superior, and deserving of his place in this world.
There is at least one thing, though, that allows us to see Michael Scott as being more likable, sympathetic, and human than Donald Trump.
Michael, of course played by the flawless Steve Carell, can be humiliated.
He doesn’t always get why he has to be humiliated, nor does he always learn a lesson from his experience. But it’s clear that he feels something, that he can feel something like shame. Sometimes he even admits that he’s wrong, too.
Of course he’s only a TV character, and Trump is a live human being. I know that. So I also know that my comparison is faulty, somewhat ridiculous, and very very unfair to Michael.
As my wife and I began watching “The Office” from the beginning, two episodes in season one stood out to me.
In episode six, Michael and the sales staff challenge Darryl and the warehouse staff to a basketball game. Loser has to come in to work on Saturday. Michael names himself captain, manager, and team star. He inserts himself into the starting lineup along with Jim, Dwight, Ryan, and the “secret weapon,” Stanley. When Michael announces that Stanley is a starter, the first one named, he adds, “of course.” Stanley asks why Michael says “of course,” and of course, Michael doesn’t answer but instead pretends he doesn’t know he said those words. When Oscar Martinez volunteers to play, Michael tells him to wait until baseball season.
Clueless? Obtuse? Unable to see beyond the stereotypes he’s been fed?
Oscar is of Mexican descent, and Stanley, if you don’t know the show, is a Black man. A large, stiff Black man. This is how Stanley dribbles:
Right hand bouncing ball, nose to the ground, left hand stuck up behind him as if it’s a broken wing.
Of course, to keep using Michael’s phrase, Michael is inept in the game. Even his free throw arcs ten feet over the hoop. And whenever he misses, Michael, in true team spirit, yells as loudly as he can, “What is wrong with me today?”
If only he asked that question more often. If only he attempted to answer it, too. If only the chief occupier of the White House asked it, too.
The other standout episode occurred in episode 3 or 4. Corporate is considering downsizing the Scranton and Stamford, CT, Dunder-Mifflin branches into one. Michael might have to fire someone, and in the reality that “The Office” approximates, you understand that the last thing Michael wants to do is to fire someone, to be un-liked. And so he looks at the camera recording his life and says,
“I’m not Donald Trump. He isn’t nice. He fires people. I want to be known as someone who hires people.”
Oh Michael. You’re thinking only of the network TV Trump, though you must be forgiven for your confusion, because, of course, Trump is still on TV and doesn’t know the difference between the character he formerly played and the one he’s playing now. Or he does and doesn’t care.
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I felt sick this morning reading an article in The New York Times, an interview by Bari Weiss of evangelical captain, Ralph Reed. I have to quote this part, however, because my sickness must be yours, too:
WEISS: I see what you are saying on the policy front. This was certainly the logic expressed by conservative Christians I know during the campaign.
But the thing I could never understand — and this has only gotten much harder to square, listening to the audio of children crying for their parents at the border — is how those who believe in a God who elevates the weak, who loves the widow and the orphan, whose own mother was denied room at the inn, how they can justify support for a president and an administration that looks like the antithesis of what I have always understood to be Christian values. What am I missing?
REED: Honestly, I think what you’re missing is his heart, and the heart of his administration. First of all, at the top of our list of the least, the lost and the vulnerable, we would put the unborn. They are children, too, and this president is defending their right to life by acting to prevent our tax dollars from being used to take their lives, which we believe is a national tragedy. Critics insisted during the 2016 campaign that he was just pretending to be pro-life to win evangelical votes. That charge has proved to be entirely false.
I recognize that till our dying day, we will be divided as a country on the issue of legal abortion. I also understand that many people vote their conscience on this issue and this issue only. Ralph Reed is entitled to his opinion on this issue and on Trump. I don’t want to speak to the issue as much as I want to challenge his other assertion, the one where he states that Trump has “a heart,” and that we’re the ones who are “missing” it.
Trump indeed has a heart, of course, or he wouldn’t be standing there, in whatever glory he thinks he’s standing in.
But I disagree that he has what emanates from the heart: compassion, decency, empathy, and a true conscience. I think Trump is a sociopath. Just my belief, which, of course, I am entitled to.
And I know this essay started with TV, so let’s end there, too. As “The Office” unfolds over its many seasons, we see the further distinction between the TV Michael Scott and the TV-Reality Donald Trump. Michael is chastened, and his heart breaks when he is parted from “Holly,” played by the incredibly good Amy Ryan. And in the end, Michael leaves his beloved office to follow Holly out west, so they can live and love together.
For in the end, Michael Scott, who drives everyone crazy at times, wants to be loved.
More importantly, he wants to give love, something I wish more of us, especially today, could relate to.
