Tim Cook, CEO of Apple Inc., went on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert. Lots of iPhone jokes. Asked about the latest Steve Jobs movie, he said he hadn’t seen any of them, but “I think that a lot of people are trying to be opportunistic, and I hate this; it’s not a great part of our world.” (A quote with a semi-colon! How great is that?)
Tim Cook, 2009.
This remark rankled Aaron Sorkin, the screenwriter of this latest Jobs flick. He’d like people to go see this movie, not dismiss it as opportunistic hatefulness. He responded from a rankled place.
At the movie’s premiere, Sorkin said, “Nobody did this movie to get rich. Secondly, Tim Cook should really see the movie before he decides what it is. Third, if you’ve got a factory full of children in China assembling phones for 17 cents an hour you’ve got a lot of nerve calling someone else opportunistic.”
Aaron Sorkin, 2009.
Then, perhaps in the throes of upwelling remorse, or perhaps seeing a chance for more publicity for the soon-to-be-released movie, Sorkin apologized:
You know what, I think that Tim Cook and I probably both went a little too far. And I apologize to Tim Cook. I hope when he sees the movie, he enjoys it as much as I enjoy his products.
Is that a gracious apology? Why, no. An apology is not a negotiation. It’s not dividing up blame. It’s not the moment for what my grandmother called Who-struck-John?
An apology is not: “I wouldn’t have said ‘Boundaries, much?’ – which I know you find very hurtful, and I’m sorry – if you hadn’t just upset me by bringing up the whole sous-vide turkey fiasco. Which you know still hurts me.”
Blame is not a pie.
Discussions about how you both behaved badly can be useful to have, but the apology should be set apart. You certainly shouldn’t wade in to an apology by declaring “We were both wrong!”
Why not? Because “We were both wrong” contains “you were wrong.” And apology is about “I was wrong.” Not “I was a little bit wrong, but you were wrong too” or “We were both equally wrong” or “You started it, but I shouldn’t have taken your bait, creepazoid.”
I feel okay about telling Sorkin this, because words are my business.
Blame is not a pie chart, either. Though you should know I had nothing to do with the sugar beets.
Please tell us more about the whole sous-vide turkey fiasco, Sumac.
There aren’t enough trigger warnings in the world for me to tell the story of the sous-vide turkey incident.
…if there are really a factory full of children in China &tc., etc. etc., why, then, did he make a film about the man and his company? Not the point, of course, but the question does present itself, and the answer is, “because he has money, and made money, and you want some too, so the whole point the man made about behaving opportunistically perhaps hit a bit too close to home.”
Of course, these are the types of inner conversations one expects to have before opening one’s mouth, not after.