If You See Something, Say Something
A Message from the MTA
Everything is material. —Philip Roth
The greatest danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it. —Michelangelo
Above: An inescapable part of my daily commute from fourteen to eighteen.
Mention the words “Metropolitan Transit Authority” to a New Yorker at your own risk.
Whether in Grand Central Station or Prospect Park, this simple, cursed treble will be met with a groan, a scowl, a huff, or a puff.
To seasoned commuters, this seemingly-innocuous phrase conjures images of scuffed, tinny sardine cans masquerading as dingy, rickety old subway cars, filthy, putrid stations, and rodents the size of capybaras.
Day in and day out, for four years of hell but a hell of a four years (as my Regis classmate Ricky once quipped), I dealt with the delays and the detritus.
I can still hear the squealing brakes, smell the burnt rubber, taste the wet humidity, and feel the touch of the stiff, scuffed turnstile.
It was an adventure—an education, even—for a young teenaged boy. In a way, each crowded, jostling, uncomfortable subway ride was a classroom and every robotic, preprogrammed announcement was a lesson.
Of these, one stood out and remains with me: If you see something, say something.
Nominally, this slogan encourages passengers to report a suspicious package, a shady character, or a crime in progress.
However, every sword cuts both ways; the inverse also holds true. After all, the simplest messages often belie profound insight.
To this, I would add: If you see something good, decent, kind, beautiful, or true, say something to the person from which it came.
A well-placed compliment or thank you or exhortation or acknowledgement can move mountains or even change the world.
Professor Tyler Cowen put it brilliantly:
At critical moments in time, you can raise the aspirations of other people significantly, especially when they are relatively young, simply by suggesting they do something better or more ambitious than what they might have in mind. It costs you relatively little to do this, but the benefit to them, and to the broader world, may be enormous.
This is in fact one of the most valuable things you can do with your time and with your life.
Showing beats telling and seeing is believing.
To wit, below are a few messages that have moved me, inspired me, kept me hunched over, pecking at this backlit keyboard, (Hell, even kept me sane while doing so!):
If you see something, be sure to say something.
Just as a single snowflake can start an avalanche, a shared observation that prompts action can change the world.
Kindness acts as a knife that can sever the yoke of doubt that hangs heavy around each and every neck. Wield it wisely to lift others up and raise their expectations, not to cut them down.
At best, you will save a life.
At worst, you may inspire the next Woolf, Picasso, Shelley, or Cèzanne.
Keep your eyes peeled and your tongue ready.
Per my about page, White Noise is a work of experimentation. I view it as a sort of thinking aloud, a stress testing of my nascent ideas. Through it, I hope to sharpen my opinions against the whetstone of other people’s feedback, commentary, and input.
If you want to discuss any of the ideas or musings mentioned above or have any books, papers, or links that you think would be interesting to share on a future edition of White Noise, please reach out to me by replying to this email or following me on Twitter X.
With sincere gratitude,
Tom
I joke that they should rewrite the phrase “say something, if and only if, you see something”
Rodents the size of capybaras. Ha! Thanks, Tom, I will avoid the MTA as if bubonic plague. Oops, do capybaras spread that?