Raking a dirty muck, Making a better society

The word “muckraker” was first used by Theodore Roosevelt, whose tenure was the golden age of the Progressive Era. At that time, progressivism was an ultimate goal of people from so broad areas – including politics, economics, labor and race - so that it cannot be easily defined. Mass media, of course, participated in the progressive movement. Journalists made every effort to search for unpleasant aspects of government affairs and businesses. They did not hesitate to “rake” all the “mucks” in their society. Thus, Theodore Roosevelt named those people as “muckrakers”. Although the word “muckraker” has a negative connotation in itself, muckrakers indeed performed positive roles by revealing all the dirty aspects of the society. They released bribery of politicians, corruption of companies, poor working conditions, unsanitary foods, and other matters.

One of the most prominent muckrakers in the Progressive Era was Upton Sinclair, the winner of Pulitzer Prize in 1943. When he wrote his novel “The Jungle”, he originally intended to rake the muck of harmful working conditions in meatpacking industry. However, people reacted to the novel unlike the expectation of Sinclair. The public focused more on the unsanitary conditions of meatpacking rather than the poor labor situation. Later Sinclair frankly stated that "I aimed at the public's heart, and by accident I hit it in the stomach." Although his initial goal was not achieved, he greatly contributed to the society anyway. People, frightened by the lack of sanitation in meatpacking industry, decreased their meat consumption by half. Not only the public, but also the government harshly criticized the meatpacking industry. Thanks to “The Jungle”, the U.S. could introduce Pure Food and Drug Act and Meat Inspection Act. In summation, the whole society was benefited from the dirty work of muckraking.

Muckrakers played a vital role in societies after the Progressive Era as well. Morgan Spurlock, the director of
“Supersize Me”, also pointed out the unpleasant features of America in 2004. In his movie “Supersize Me”, he elaborated on the overweight problem of the U.S., by eating only super-size McDonald’s hamburgers for 30 days. The result of his experiment gave immense shock to the public. He not only gained weights of 11kg, but suffered from mood swings, sexual dysfunction and accumulation of fat in his liver as well. His physical and psychological sacrifice was compensated by the awakening of the public as well as McDonald’s. It can be taken for granted that the revenue of McDonald’s plummeted for a while. In addition, all the super-size hamburgers were removed from menu and McDonald’s opened every ingredient of hamburgers to public. It is hard to doubt that Morgan Spurlock is a beneficial muckraker who made the U.S. healthy.

In addition to Spurlock, the most recent and outstanding case of muckraking is WikiLeaks, which has disclosed countless secrets of governments and nations. Among those secret documents, the reveal of corrupt Tunisia government led to the Jasmine Revolution and raised the public discontent towards military rules in Northern Africa. Such dissatisfaction even spread to Egypt, where Mubarak resigned as a consequence of the public’s needs for democracy. Obviously, WikiLeaks raked the mucks and removed them, too. Although it is controversial to judge whether Julian Assange is a modern Che Guevara in the Digital Age or just an extreme cyber-terrorist since WikiLeaks is so recent, at the very least, the public noticed that their governments and nations have hidden tremendous sums of “mucks”. In other words, the public learned that they are the victims of inequality of information. Such awakening of the public, done by a modern muckraker, should not be underestimated.

In conclusion, as Mitford once said, the term “muckraker” has more to do with “positive” than “negative”. As the aforementioned examples of Upton Sinclair, Morgarn Spurlcok and Julian Assange demonstrate, muckrakers are street cleaners in society. They deal with “muck” that no one feel inclined to be in charge of so that they ultimately contribute to the society.