A gaffe is a gift not to be wasted: every gaffe represents a teaching moment

Is letting her go, for one episode (with Williams), any worse than letting Williams go for one comment on Fox News (that he got nervous when people in "Muslim garb" got on an airplane)? Structurally they might seem the same. But NPR's day-after explanation about Williams was that this was the culmination of years-long disagreements with him about his role as a Fox commentator. I know nothing first-hand about the merits of that explanation; but its essence is different from [Ellen] Weiss's situation, in which one instance of misjudgment appears to trump her reputation and achievement over the decades.

via James Fallows

One of the things I like about the web and blogging is how it distorts time. Commenting on something weeks, months or even, perhaps, years ago makes sense. The blogger can link back to an underlying event or text and the reader can examine the source material for him or herself.

So even though I am commenting on old "stale" news — it's two weeks ago — I want to relate to the sad Juan Williams affair. It now gets compounded with the firing of Ellen Weiss. It seems to me that when gaffes happen — and we all do — the tendency is "off with their heads!"

It also seems to me that, to paraphrase Rahm Emmnual, a serious gaffe is a gift not to be wasted: every gaffe represents a teaching moment. But what did we do with Juan Williams, Ellen Weiss, or for that matter, Helen Thomas. They are disappeared and done in silence, without any explanation. 

Much better would be to expand upon a teaching moment. I am sure that some gaffes are so egregious or crude that there is little to be done. But the 3 examples above seem like a huge waste of talent and we lose an opportunity to learn.

Of course institutions are notoriously bad at self-reflection and are incapable of extending apology, explanation etc. I'll let the psychologists explain but in a subsequent post I'll tell you about one incident related to Muslims in which I was indirectly involved; and it's an unfortunate story also wasting a great teaching moment, and yet by a highly credentialed teacher.