The underlying message of the Neighborhood
November 23, 2015 7:09 AM   Subscribe

"I can still hear him signing off his show similar to the way he concluded his letter to Amy Melder: “You’ve made this day a special day by just your being you. There is no person in the whole world like you, and I like you just the way you are.” Some have suggested that this message sought to instill children with a sense of self-importance, but to believe that is to fundamentally misunderstand Fred Rogers. At the core of Rogers’ mission was the paradoxical Christian belief that the way to gain one’s life is to give it away." (SL Atlantic)
posted by roomthreeseventeen (36 comments total) 38 users marked this as a favorite
 
Mr. Rogers is a saint, not as a religious figure, but as a human one.
posted by librosegretti at 7:34 AM on November 23, 2015 [22 favorites]


That was sweet.

We're atheists, but my three-year-old became entranced with Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood nearly 2 years ago and has since graduated to old episodes of Mr. Rogers (though he prefers the live-action segments and wants me to skip over the Land of Make Believe--I guess he has Daniel Tiger for that stuff) and I could not be happier with his media choices. It's pretty much all he watches. As sick as I am of watching the same episodes (just what's on Netflix) over and over again, we could do a lot worse and I feel that we're all so lucky that Mr. Rogers existed in the world and left such a lasting, accessible legacy.

(Also, we live in Pittsburgh, so we are literally in Mr. Roger's Neighborhood, which makes it a bit more special for my son as he sees the places he goes--and even some people that we know--in the live action segments of both Daniel Tiger and Mr. Rogers.)
posted by soren_lorensen at 7:36 AM on November 23, 2015 [30 favorites]


1) Fred Rogers is a saint, and we really, really, really need more people like him. Where are they all hiding?

2) In a society where my computer is obsolete before I open the box, I am continually amazed at how people like Fred Rogers (and Bob Ross) just won't die out in popularity. It's wonderful.
posted by Melismata at 7:44 AM on November 23, 2015 [15 favorites]


Why doesn't Netflix have the whole oeuvre?
posted by Don Pepino at 7:46 AM on November 23, 2015 [3 favorites]


I think he's the best thing Pittsburgh ever made. Of all the good things that I ever heard of that came out of that beautiful, strange, sweet, kind, bighearted city. Tops Andy Warhol and Carnegie and Mellon and Carnegie Mellon, steel and smoke and Primanti Bros., all of it. Okay, August Wilson is a rival.
posted by Don Pepino at 7:53 AM on November 23, 2015 [10 favorites]


I think he's the best thing Pittsburgh ever made.

It's a toss-up between him and Mad Mex's half-off margarita deal.
posted by grumpybear69 at 7:56 AM on November 23, 2015 [11 favorites]


This is the best Mr. Rogers memorial in the city. The more "official" statue is weird and kind of horrifying. The Children's Museum has a bunch of the puppets and his cardigan and sneakers, and the History Center has the Neighborhood of Make Believe set. You could spend quite a nice weekend here doing a little tour of all of that with your kids.
posted by soren_lorensen at 7:59 AM on November 23, 2015 [3 favorites]


Fred Rogers should be canonized as the patron saint of the Internet.

From the (apparently defunct) Home Recording Rights Association's site:
How Mr. Rogers Saved the VCR

In ruling that home time-shift recording of television programming for private use was not copyright infringement, the Supreme Court relied on testimony from television producers who did not object to such home recording. One of the most prominent witnesses on this issue was Fred Rogers.

The Supreme Court wrote:

"Second is the testimony of Fred Rogers, president of the corporation that produces and owns the copyright on Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood. The program is carried by more public television stations than any other program. Its audience numbers over 3,000,000 families a day. He testified that he had absolutely no objection to home taping for noncommercial use and expressed the opinion that it is a real service to families to be able to record children’s programs and to show them at appropriate times. "

(Excerpt from Mr. Rogers’ trial testimony: ) "Some public stations, as well as commercial stations, program the ’Neighborhood’ at hours when some children cannot use it. . . . I have always felt that with the advent of all of this new technology that allows people to tape the ’Neighborhood’ off-the-air, and I’m speaking for the ’Neighborhood’ because that’s what I produce, that they then become much more active in the programming of their family’s television life. Very frankly, I am opposed to people being programmed by others. My whole approach in broadcasting has always been ’You are an important person just the way you are. You can make healthy decisions.’ Maybe I’m going on too long, but I just feel that anything that allows a person to be more active in the control of his or her life, in a healthy way, is important."
It's no exaggeration to say that Rogers pulled the future out from between the RIAA's teeth that day. If the ruling on your right to make copies and time-shift - which is basically what any computer connecting to the internet does - had gone the wrong way, the internet as we know it today wouldn't exist.
posted by mhoye at 7:59 AM on November 23, 2015 [81 favorites]


Fred Rogers is a saint, and we really, really, really need more people like him. Where are they all hiding?

They are there. They are generally quiet and not very visible by nature. There is a vicious cycle in our culture, where the biggest jerks also tend to be huge self-promoters, so the average public image of humanity seen in the media tends to be fairly jerky, which normalized that behavior and encourages others to be jerks. Perhaps that's the greatest miracle behind Fred Rogers, that people actually saw him.
posted by JHarris at 8:05 AM on November 23, 2015 [29 favorites]


1) Fred Rogers is a saint, and we really, really, really need more people like him. Where are they all hiding?

Look for the helpers.
posted by DigDoug at 8:06 AM on November 23, 2015 [68 favorites]


For me Mr. Rogers has always been an exemplar of what it is to be a Christian. He didn't preach empty words, he didn't use his position to extort people with guilt or fear. He extended comfort and understanding to people. He wanted to share knowledge and love. The neighbor metaphor of Christ's message tied in very well to Mister Rogers Neighborhood.
He also demonstrated how simply you can teach the lessons of Christ without proselytizing or simply reading back passages from the Bible.
Also anyone who thinks that Mr. Rogers message of everyone is special instills children with an over-inflated sense of self-importance never watched the whole show and actually absorbed it's message.
posted by MrBobaFett at 8:21 AM on November 23, 2015 [30 favorites]


> 1) Fred Rogers is a saint, and we really, really, really need more people like him. Where are they all hiding?

here's a wikipedia article on a concept from mystical Judaism that might be useful for understanding the type of person Fred Rogers was.

The unique miracle of the man is that he was paradoxically not just a Lamedvavnik, but a somehow prominent and overtly influential Lamedvavnik. Most people of his type end up quietly and invisibly fixing the world; he managed to quietly fix the world even though he had TV cameras pointed at him on a regular basis.
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 8:30 AM on November 23, 2015 [18 favorites]


Mr. Rogers was a wonderful person, but he existed in a structure of helpful people and circumstances that allowed his gifts to be manifest. Someone pointed the camera, someone helped produce the show, the entire PBS network came into existence -- everyone plays a part.

All of you reading this are playing a part, too. Talking about what made him so great is a way of fostering those virtues in our culture. Maybe a kindness you do in your job, in your family, or in your local community makes slightly larger kindnesses in the world a tiny bit more possible.
posted by amtho at 8:35 AM on November 23, 2015 [18 favorites]


DigDoug: "Look for the helpers."

I'm pretty sure I saw that posted at least ten times on my Facebook feed in the days after the Paris attack.
posted by octothorpe at 8:43 AM on November 23, 2015 [1 favorite]


National Lampoon teased out the underlying message of the Magic Kingdom.

"I'd like to hear you play your bass so let's go to the Magic Kingdom."

"Oh no man. Not me. It's too early. I gotta drive."
posted by three blind mice at 8:47 AM on November 23, 2015


Fred Rogers is absolutely in the running for "best human being of the 20th century." What's astounding is that the qualities of his television personality were his actual personal qualities, as has been recounted by countless adults and children who interacted with him over the years.

A great book for those interested in Rogers is I'm Proud of You: My Friendship with Fred Rogers by Tim Madigan. Read with a tissue nearby.
posted by slkinsey at 9:09 AM on November 23, 2015 [4 favorites]


Mister Rogers, the iconic television host, was a Presbyterian minister—but his show touched people of all faiths.

And of none.
posted by Naberius at 9:22 AM on November 23, 2015 [25 favorites]


I too now live in Mr. Rogers' actual neighborhood, and just last night was pointing out to my 3-year-old that a scene from Daniel Tiger takes place downtown! At the time I moved here, I somehow didn't know that Mr. Rogers was from Pittsburgh, but now I feel like I see where the show came from all the time, in the way that I actually interact with neighbors and other community members. I do have a kind of quasi-religious attitude of veneration toward him, and when I meet people who knew him in real life, which is bound to happen if you live in Pittsburgh, I have a feeling probably not unlike a pilgrim seeing a piece of the true cross or something. Anyway, I can never read enough about him. (Previously: pastabagel on how Mr. Rogers was the last earnest man.)
posted by chinston at 9:23 AM on November 23, 2015 [5 favorites]


I always preferred Captain Kangaroo, personally
posted by thelonius at 9:35 AM on November 23, 2015


Captain Kangaroo can be great along with Mr. Rogers, it doesn't have to be one or the other. Kangaroo had a bit more irreverence to him, more comedy, while Mr. Rogers just was. He didn't have to be anything more.

(I've been considering a post about the good Captain for a long while now, but there's not a lot of color Kangaroo to be found on YouTube.)
posted by JHarris at 9:51 AM on November 23, 2015 [9 favorites]


it doesn't have to be one or the other.

I'm sure you are right, but I am just reporting how it was. Like when the ping pong balls would come down on his head! Mr. Rogers could not compete with that.
posted by thelonius at 10:23 AM on November 23, 2015


How did I miss that Mr Rogers was a Netflix option for the preschool set? I'll have to try it out on my kid.
posted by typecloud at 10:27 AM on November 23, 2015


The ping-pong balls were, it is true, terrific.
posted by JHarris at 10:33 AM on November 23, 2015 [2 favorites]


Not only are they not all there on Netflix but they're all out of sequence. I didn't know this because I didn't watch every day when I was in the targeted demographic, but apparently the make believe stories were little serials. So you start at 1 and you're in the middle of some long involved thing about Daniel Tiger and you have no idea how he got into this terrible fix. Plus Mr. Rogers ages ten years, then regresses five, then ages fifteen, zooming up and down with no rhyme or reason. It's really weird they did it like this and I want them to fix it.
posted by Don Pepino at 10:37 AM on November 23, 2015 [7 favorites]


My life still bears the fingerprints of his influence.

Absolutely. In a childhood characterized by neglect and abuse, Fred Rogers' messages of self-worth/-regulation/-determination were critical.
posted by sutureselves at 11:10 AM on November 23, 2015 [3 favorites]


The article doesn't mention that before he went to seminary, Fred Rogers got a degree in music composition. Some of his songs, including the one everybody knows, are available for download on PBS.
posted by lagomorphius at 11:32 AM on November 23, 2015 [2 favorites]


This is just what I needed today. Thank you so much for posting.
posted by ApathyGirl at 11:50 AM on November 23, 2015


A guy I worked with told me that, having lived in Mr. Rogers's neighborhood while the man was still alive, he saw a young woman moving into an apartment at the beginning of a semester, and old Fred happened by and, even though at the time he was much older than her parents, he helped her and her parents move her stuff in.
Just being neighborly, I guess.

And somehow it never occurred to me until just now, the "love your neighbor as yourself"/"won't you be my neighbor" connection.
posted by Mister Moofoo at 12:07 PM on November 23, 2015 [5 favorites]


Whenever there's a MeFi post about anything related to Pittsburgh or food, I feel like I'm the person who brings up Rick Sebak. THAT BEING SAID, he produced/directed a great documentary about Mr. Rogers, with Michael Keaton (!) narrating...it even starts with a clip of Keaton on Mr. Rogers Neighborhood ( picture here). Worth watching if you get a chance.
posted by pxe2000 at 12:13 PM on November 23, 2015 [4 favorites]


This is where I get to say that the other day my friend got to play celesta with the Carnegie Mellon University orchestra, and the instrument she played BELONGED TO MR. ROGERS' NEIGHBORHOOD. Had a worn-off sticker on it and everything.

That's right: she played TROLLEY.
posted by St. Hubbins at 1:38 PM on November 23, 2015 [13 favorites]


pxe2000 - is that the America's Favorite Neighbor one that PBS ran some? If so, I second your recommendation.

If not, I must pick it up.
posted by Rev. Syung Myung Me at 11:13 PM on November 23, 2015


I always preferred Captain Kangaroo, personally

There's a lot to recommend the show, but it has to be said that Bob Keeshan was well-known for being a total asshole, sort of the Anti-Fred Rogers of children's television.
posted by briank at 5:48 AM on November 24, 2015


I recommend Holly Yarbrough's swing takes on classic Neighborhood songs on the album Mr. Rogers Swings!
posted by brainwane at 11:13 AM on November 24, 2015


I will dispute this claim of Keeshan's assholishness. The man cared deeply about his job and his kids, and would not compromise in that regard. On this, I may have more to say later.
posted by JHarris at 5:50 PM on November 24, 2015 [1 favorite]


Mr Rogers saved my life.
posted by thatone at 7:13 PM on November 27, 2015 [2 favorites]


Mister Rogers talks to kids about violence and how bad things like killing happen. Presented in the wake of the killing of John Lennon and the attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan, this clip is often spoken of, but has rarely been seen in almost 35 years.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 4:33 PM on December 8, 2015


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