Everyone can have something to say about one subject or another, but not everyone is qualified to testify.
The platform or opportunity may be appealing, but mounting it without credibility, experience, or facts may result in one looking like an imposter, opportunist, or a fool. People will either embellish, misrepresent, or leave out chunks of information. With no pushback or fact-checking, fiction strangely becomes fact.
When the accuracy of information is at stake, a person has to have something to contribute, besides being seen.
When credible sources are readily available, why are they often overlooked?
On several episodes of Judge Judy, she emphasized the necessity—no—her DEMAND for evidence and witnesses.
“If you tell the truth, you won’t have to have a good memory”, she’d say.
She would look over and see who accompanied the plaintiff, especially if their story needed help with continuity.
“Stand up. Who are you? Who’s he? Were you there? Was he there? What can HE tell me that’s pertinent to this case?”
The plaintiff would reply that the person was either there for moral support, or that they were “around”, or “heard about” what had taken place.
The person who COULD have actually testified, and shed considerable light on the matter, either “had to work”, “wasn’t able to come”, “didn’t want to be involved”, or the plaintiff didn’t think they were important enough to ask or bring.
“I didn’t think they needed to come”.
A dumbfounded, and exasperated Judy would yell, “I don’t accept heresay! I don’t accept statements! Where is your WITNESS? Didn’t you know you were coming to court? You mean you could have brought a witness instead of your boyfriend ? What’d ya bring HIM for? Vacation? You don’t want to say anything to me DO, you? No? I didn’t think so. Sit down!”
Without credible witnesses, the cases, although entertaining, would fall apart, and be dismissed.
In the closing interview, the plaintiff would lament, “I know. I should have brought_______ instead of him. He would have been able to tell her what REALLY happened”.
To have had the opportunity to present an eyewitness, but instead, present someone with second or third hand information—or zero information, is the kind of thing that should make a person kick oneself.
Some will see the problem, (and be as perplexed as Judy often was). Details are skipped, or fuzzy, dates are inaccurate, statements are inconsistent, priorities are minimized, names and faces are forgotten, and key players are glossed over.
Stubborn, clueless, or willfully exclusionary people, won’t see anything wrong with any of that.
What’s the reason for the disconnect, and seeming disdain for accuracy and authenticity? Is it personal?
History matters. Stories matter. WHOLE stories, matter. Who we like or prefer, or want to “put on”, hook up, or bring along, can’t eclipse the principal thing, or principal players.
What, or who we don’t think is important, relevant, or necessary, could be the difference between excellence and mediocrity, success and failure, knowledge or ignorance.
It’s one thing if something or someone is impossible to obtain or secure. It’s another, when resources abound, but are tossed aside. What could have been comprehensive, enlightening, educational, or informative, ends up leaving a lot of questions on the table.
It matters who’s responsible for ANY information that’s presented as truth. Those who have been given authority to contribute, need to be honest about their limitations, and respectfully yield the floor, seat, podium, microphone, or platform, to the actual witnesses they KNOW exist. History—accurate history—is an enemy of the insecure, and a requirement of the honest.
Truth tellers are not hard to find. They’re right under everyone’s noses. The question is “Did anyone bother to ask them for their input?”
No one should tell, or document your story better than you, and it absolutely matters who you enlist to help tell it—if you want it to be thorough and believable.
When crucial pieces are missing, a documentary becomes a short story.
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