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Opinion editor’s note: Strib Voices publishes a mix of guest commentaries online and in print each day. To contribute, click here. I was one of the people interviewed for “A Precarious State,” the documentary that talked about issues facing Minnesota and Minneapolis (precariousstate.com). If you have not seen it, the documentary lays out big issues facing both the state of Minnesota and city of Minneapolis. These issues include: If you don’t think these things are issues, everything the documentary talks about is backed up by data and citations. I have been watching the response to the documentary and there have been a number of themes. One theme is attacking the documentary without even watching it. This comes in two strains. One strain is people reflexively attacking it because they do not want to step out of their filter bubble. The second strain is people who could not watch it because the funders were not named, even though the data used was scrupulously documented and it was reputable reporters who produced it. This seems to imply that people are not intelligent enough to watch something and make up their own minds about it. The issue of finding out who funded it was so important that the Minnesota Star Tribune wrote a whole article about its sleuthing to find out who it was (“Anonymous funders of ‘Precarious State’ film stay ... anonymous,” Oct. 17). Oddly, the article didn’t say, “Don’t read the Star Tribune because it is owned by the richest guy in Minnesota,” but the logic is the same. There is no nefarious plot behind who funded the documentary — it was business leaders concerned about the direction of the state. They didn’t want their names out there because they knew that they would be personally attacked for raising serious issues and their names would distract from the important messages in the documentary. And for those concerned it is some sort of propaganda, you have to ask: Propaganda for what? The documentary talks about the need for education reform. For rethinking our economic growth strategies. For real solutions to crime in Minneapolis. For finding ways to make people want to move to a cold, high-tax, high-regulation state. Hard to see that as propaganda. Another theme is those who reflexively dump on those opposite of them. Conservatives who dumped on Democrats because Democrats dominate in Minneapolis. The far left who dumped on obvious “conservatives” because only conservatives would bring up issues with the bucolic Minneapolis.
