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Monday, October 12th, 2009
In the past, recipients of the Nobel Peace Prize had to mother starving orphans in Calcutta or create peaceful solutions to apartheid—now in 2009, apparently they just have to be Barack Obama.
This brings to mind the question: what exactly has President Obama done to be worthy of the prize? In January of this year, Obama made history as being the first African-American president of the United States. Since inauguration, he has made rousing speeches about “change”, frustrated peace efforts in the Middle East (and one wonders, should the U.S. even play mediator?), and begun the process of forming a pseudo-socialized healthcare system for his country; none of which are worthy of Nobel’s distinguished honour.
When one considers that Obama has been president less than a year, and that the deadline to nominate someone for the prize closed 12 days after he entered office, it is a mystery how he was nominated for the award, let alone how he had the audacity to accept it.
A flurry of outraged and baffled people attacked the Nobel committee’s decision. One, a student in Israel, wrote in his blog, “Thank you Nobel Prize Committee for awarding the most ridiculous Nobel Prize for Peace since 1994, when you awarded one to the terrorist leader Yasser Arafat…Well done and kudos!”
The Nobel committee justified their decision by saying, “Only rarely has a person to the same extent as Obama captured the world’s attention and given its people hope for a better future.”
In other words, “Let’s pat Mr. Obama on the back because he’s a nice guy.”
Being a nice guy, however, shouldn’t be enough to get someone a Nobel. Mohandas Gandhi was more than just a nice guy, and he didn’t receive the award though he was nominated for it five times. So why give Obama an award on the basis of his conspicuously absent list of peaceable achievements? Perhaps because he’s black and he’s eloquent.
I’m not being racist, I’m pointing out a fact. As the first African-American leader of the United States, President Obama embodies the slogan of “change” that he touts to the masses in his speeches. Since it was once thought impossible for a black man to get into office, his presence suggests the possibility for other people to change the situations they find themselves in.
Essentially, the award is tantamount to racism, because it is not being given to Obama for any contribution, other than being the first black man to kick up his heels behind the Presidential desk. This flies in the face of Martin Luther King Jr.’s dream of seeing his children living in a nation where they would “not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”
Some could see this award not just as a form of racism, but also of nationalism. President Obama responded to the award by saying, “I do not view it as recognition of my own accomplishments, but rather as an affirmation of American leadership on behalf of aspirations held by people in all nations.”
It is little wonder that the U.S. is considered an “Obama-nation” in the world sphere. Not only has it fruitlessly spent time telling Israeli and Palestinian children to play nice and share, its charismatic cult leader has also robbed the world of the Nobel Peace Prize when he has done nothing to earn it.
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