Why Be Best is the worst when it could have been the best
- Pretty Docs
- Sep 8, 2018
- 6 min read
Updated: Dec 26, 2021
It’s been four months since First Lady Melania Trump launched her initiative, Be Best, a campaign aimed at ending cyber bullying, improving overall child well-being, and treating rampant opioid abuse. While President Trump demonstrated his support by declaring May 7th as national Be Best day, the campaign has failed to gain any real traction, instead only managing to garner fodder for news outlets and late-night talk shows since it’s unveiling.
Much like her husband’s campaign, Mrs. Trumps’ Be Best initiative is yet another missed opportunity to garner bipartisan support and destroy political and socioeconomic barriers dividing Americans today.
Had her campaign confronted with authenticity, the ever-present battle over immigration it could have been one, if not the best, first lady initiative ever. Moreover, its lack of support, the behaviors of the president and first lady, and its propensity for fodder are glaring proof that Be Best is arguably the worst first lady campaign ever.
While I argue that Mrs. Trump’s campaign won’t be remembered beyond its awkwardness two presidents from now, we all remember Nancy Reagan’s Just Say No campaign, or even most recently Michelle Obama’s push for us all to get moving with her Let’s Move! initiative.
And even if you don’t precisely remember Laura Bush’s literacy campaign, you probably remember it concerned books, she was a librarian, and that she read to children. What will be remembered of Melania Trump’s campaign and slogan years from now? What will we celebrate on May 7, 2019 or on May 7, 2020?
Be catchy?
Be Best is certainly catchy, but not for the best reasons. It is marked for its awkwardness rather than its poignancy. From the outset, we recognize this slogan as the English language maxim to Be the Best or to Be Your Best. However, knowledge of this fails to answer any real questions about the slogan in regards to the campaign. We get that we are being asked, told, or even strongly urged to be our best. But in what regard?
Slovenian, Mrs. Trump’s first language, does not use articles such as “the,” “a,” or “an.” Therefore the English slogan Be the Best, or Be Your Best translates to Be Best in Slovenian. Is Be Best a familiar Slovenian expression? We have no idea. While be best is the perfect hashtag, the missing article is not addressed in any manner by the campaign.
For native English speakers, the missing article, lends more than just an awkward quality to the slogan. It further disconnects us from the FLOTUS, her experiences, and her motivations.
Be memorable?
This campaign’s memorable qualities are to the detriment of the campaign rather than to its benefit. Four months later, it is most remembered for its awkwardness (I can’t say that enough) and underwhelming qualities. What do you remember about Michelle Obama’s Get Moving!? If you remember nothing else from Mrs. Obama’s first campaign, you more than likely remember it featured the iconic Beyoncé, and you may remember it included eating fresh veggies from the White House garden.
What do you remember most about Nancy Reagan’s Just Say No? Although her campaign is much older, it has seen the longest lasting effects of any first lady campaign before or after her. It is most memorable because her campaign complimented her husband’s continuation of the War on Drugs. It was catchy. It was relevant. And it is still memorable, still catchy, still relevant 38 long years later. As a matter-of-fact, FLOTUS could have plagiarized Mrs. Reagan’s slogan for her current opioid initiative.
What will we remember from Mrs. Trump’s campaign and her slogan? While opioid abuse is this era’s crack epidemic which Mrs. Reagan’s campaign successfully addressed, we haven’t yet seen Mrs. Trump’s campaign and endeavors mentioned in the same breath during coverage of the opioid crisis. The slogan is incongruous and not worth mentioning while reporting on the increase in opioid overdoses and the real need for the medical community and everyday citizens to begin stocking Narcan.
I guess we can all be our best and stock up on Narcan in case the neighbor two houses down overdoses??
Be relevant?
As with the first time Mrs. Trump addressed the American public (remember the memes after her speech at the 2016 Republican National Convention where she plagiarized Michelle Obama’s speech), most of us are baffled by Be Best. Are we being asked to be our best at ending cyber bullying? Should we be our best in improving children’s well-beings? How should we be the best concerning rampant opioid abuse?
Content-wise the campaign ambitiously combines cyber bullying, opioid abuse, and overall child well-being. Overall child well-being, let’s unpack that for a moment. What does it mean exactly, especially in correlation with cyber bullying and opioid abuse? It’s just another phrase, another stacked modifier, lacking real substance in this campaign. I hate the term overall child well-being as much as I hate the term family values. It’s an empty placeholder that requires little to no action but agreement on the part of everyone that something needs to be done. Why exactly can’t we be transparent here and completely specific when discussing a child’s well-being?
Without any real context or a central anchor, Be Best, seems like what one would say when they have no advice to offer. You know something trite like:
“I don’t know how you can get off those opioids, but you know, just be your best.”
Or another winner:
“I don’t know what to do about the bullying on social media and at your school, just be your best.”
The campaign’s oddly combined focus, together with its awkward slogan truly misses the mark of what could have been an authentic moment for this first lady and for the issues of immigration. You can’t separate this campaign from the reputation and shenanigans of this president and his administration, especially where immigration is concerned.
This campaign could have been very successful if it addressed the elephant in the room because this elephant is large, some say its orange and it’s loud. Some might argue the elephant is a wall.
Instead of focusing on cyber bullying and opioid abuse, the campaign should have focused on promoting a right and legal path to American citizenship. Furthermore it should have celebrated our nation’s international roots and cultural melting pot. In this regard, this campaign could have been mega successful.
Imagine the campaign slogan Be Best translated into 15 other languages. Imagine this campaign built upon former president George W. Bush’s 2006 program STARTALK, which sought “to expand and improve the teaching and learning of strategically important world languages that are not now widely taught in the US.” Imagine this campaign discussed the various translations of Be Best: from the Russian “Find the Best in You” to the German “Give Your Best” to the Haitian Creole “You Should Be More Good.”
Imagine this campaign celebrated our first lady’s cultural roots and diversity; her legal path to citizenship in the United States; and the fact that she speaks Slovenian, English, German, Italian, French; and practices Catholicism. Imagine the poignancy of this campaign focusing on all that she embodies.
She is after all, living the immigrant’s loftiest version of the American Dream: from immigrant (worker) model to First Lady of the United States.
Be the best?
Last but certainly not least, the campaign to Be Best should at a minimum be a mantra for the first lady. How can you advocate for the American people to Be Best when you as first lady fail to model your best behavior? On June 21st, first lady Melania Trump visited one of the immigration children shelters in Texas where children who had been separated from their parents when illegally crossing the border of Mexico into Texas, were being housed. During this trip as she deplaned at Andrews Air Force Base and boarded her plane, she infamously wore an olive-green jacket with the words “I Really Don’t Care. Do U?” scrawled on the back. The statement piece garnered a swift reaction from the media and American people and left many, again, baffled by her statement. Her staff quickly responded that there was no hidden meaning with the first lady’s wardrobe choice while also admonishing the press for even focusing on the jacket. Of course, in true contrarian fashion, the president tweeted that the verbiage was a direct statement to the fake news media.
Regardless of what the true intentions were not, the decision to wear this jacket at such an important time, truly a defining moment for our country as we decide who we are as nation while separating families who cross the border, was not the first lady’s best moment. If she truly wanted us to believe, or even believed herself in a notion of a better or best people, her statement should have been just that. Her jacket should have read, “Be Best.”
** For more information on STARTALK, see https://startalk.umd.edu/public/. **