Few people like to hear bad news, especially from their leaders in bad times, when we all seek solace and comfort. But telling people good news is easy, even (or especially) if it isn’t true; while telling people things they need to hear that they would rather not, is much more difficult, and therefore a more important test of leadership. In Ibsen’s An Enemy of the People, the bad news is that the new public baths have been poisoned by the local tannery, just as the tourist season is starting, (this, of course, is the frame for the 1975 Spielberg movie “Jaws”). In the play, the hero, Dr Stockmann, fails to persuade his brother, the mayor, to close the baths and is then shouted down at a town meeting for trying to persuade the people that they have an unpopular but necessary duty to perform; they call him “the enemy of the people.” This is the opposite of telling people lies that keep loyal followers happy.

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