Finally got around to see Greatest Showman tonight, and while I loved it as a movie, I left feeling quite disturbed regarding its misportrayal of P.T. Barnum. The movie showed him as a man who had a soft spot for those who were odd and abandoned by society and brought them together as a family. While most “based on a true story” movies are not entirely accurate, this one just takes a bit too far. P.T. Barnum was a man who started the circus business by purchasing and displaying a slave for 12 hours a day, claiming she was 161 years old and served as George Washington’s nurse, and then when she died he sold tickets to her autopsy. Call me a skeptic, but it is hard to think someone who put eccentric people on public display for money did so because he wanted to “celebrate humanity” (true quote from the movie).
That bothers me. In this day and age where fake news is now the norm rather than the exception, it’s most likely people will take what they see at the movies as a genuine biography of this man. Perhaps in the grand scheme of things it really doesn’t matter even if he goes down in history as the greatest showman who also had a good heart and loved his family. But it still bothers me.
Then I remind myself that it does not matter what others think of you, whether good or bad, at the end of the day it still matters most what you think of yourself. Honestly I will also never know what kind of a man he truly was, so who am I to judge?
Still, I dream of a world where truth prevails.
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