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Michael Moore is sick and tired, and he’s not going to take it anymore. In his latest documentary, Sicko, in-your-face writer/director Moore addresses the issue of the United States’ health care system—comparing it to the universal health care systems in other countries. He begins by pointing out the flaws in the American system—showing how HMOs keep making more and more money, while health care workers are encouraged to deny treatment, payment, or even coverage to those who need it. He then continues by looking at health care in other countries—those with universal health care, where no patients are turned away, no matter what their income.
Michael Moore doesn’t hide his feelings—so I won’t, either. I’m not a big fan of Moore’s work. But my frustration with Michael Moore doesn’t lie in his beliefs. I believe that the health care system in the United States needs serious help. And I agree that gun control is a good thing. My problem, however, lies in Moore’s approach. It’s loud and sarcastic—and it has no problem with over-dramatizing and playing with the facts a bit, as long as it makes him look right.
For instance, in Bowling for Columbine, Moore portrayed Canadians, as a whole, as pacifists—to the point that they appeared to be ridiculously naïve. Moore’s Canadians don’t own guns. They’re non-violent, and they leave their doors unlocked—enabling documentary filmmakers to walk right in. What he didn’t mention is that many Americans are non-violent people who don’t own guns (or lock their doors during the day)—or that had he tried that trick in a different Toronto neighborhood, he probably would have been shot.
It’s the same in Sicko. Instead of calmly discussing the facts—as Al Gore did so effectively in An Inconvenient Truth—Moore tries to get people riled up. He pushes the information on his audience, carefully picking and choosing his facts and emphasizing them with sarcasm and fake surprise. He plays the stereotypical “ignorant American” well, asking new European parents, “How much did you pay for that baby?” and acting surprised when they say they didn’t have to pay to give birth. (But do you really think he didn’t already know?) He shows how the grass is greener everywhere else—how countries like France, Canada, the UK, and even Cuba are a sort of health care utopia, where everything is free. No one has to pay for health care. Or wait in lines. Or deal with billing headaches. Of course, he doesn’t point out that not everything in those countries is free—or that there are taxes involved. Nor does he mention that people in those countries do, occasionally, have to wait for several months for surgery.
Sicko is designed to scare the living crap out of you—and it will. It will make you think that, should you ever need surgery, you’ll end up footing the bill, selling your house, and moving into your kids’ basement. It will make you think that you’d be better off in Cuba—until you realize that Moore isn’t telling the whole story. Yes, he does make some excellent points. And he’s definitely entertaining. But he’s anything but fair and objective. He takes advantage of people’s willingness to blindly follow along. He tries to make people angry—and, well, he succeeds.
It’s unfortunate, though, that Moore doesn’t come at it with a gentler, more even-handed approach. Because after watching Sicko, I felt more frustrated with Moore than with the health care system.
