Bow to the absurd

OK, OK, stop. Seriously GOP/Fox News, just stop it. You're making yourselves look plain old fashioned silly.


I'm referring to the latest deliberate dust up of dumb coming over the news feeds. The fact that the President of the United States bowed to Emperor Akihito of Japan during his visit to my adopted home country last week.


Seriously, this is a joke . . . right? You can't possibly be concerned about this.
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I'm being told by my editors that they are, in fact, serious. By the way, my editors only exist in my head, take that for what you will.

The short version of this story is that the President had a face to face meeting with the Emperor and bowed deeply while shaking his hand. And the problem is . . . What exactly?

The problem is that the Faux News people are all puffed up and outraged over the fact that America bows to NO ONE!! (U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A) and the fact that Emperor Akihito is the son of the Showa Emperor (known in life as Emperor Hirohito), the man who reigned when the Japanese bombed pearl harbor.

As usual, the Fox Noise people are a bunch of idiots. But the REASON that they are idiots and this unique flavor of wrong deserve discussion and examination therefore I present:

THE THREE REASONS YOU SUCK:

1. A BOW DOESN'T MEAN WHAT YOU THINK IT MEANS.

In the western world, a bow has only a handful of uses. A) When admitting defeat or surrender. B) When accepting applause on stage. C) Admitting complete inferiority to another person (Fans bowing to a rock star chanting 'We're not worthy' for example). Under this limited definition, the News Models are absolutely right to be outraged. Unless he just finished a sax performance, the POTUS shouldn't bow to anyone (Oh, wait. They hate the sax guy too).

However, in Japan, the bow is a COMPLETELY different animal. The proper degree and length of a bow changes considerably based on factors such as location, occasion, and the relative social status of the individuals involved. Entire books have been written on this topic, but I will focus on the occasion that that is applicable here, greetings.

In this case, a bow is the cultural equivalent of a handshake. As I explain to my students when teaching the etiquette of a handshake, the origin of both the handshake and the greeting bow is to show trust, peace, and friendship. In other words, you are saying "I trust you enough to expose my neck to you and assume you will be kind enough not to cut my head off." Much like in the west, where the handshake says "I come to you with open hand and I trust you will not stab me now that I am in dagger range."

Besides, the President was on foreign soil. Whenever one travels to another country, it is right and proper for that person to at least try to follow local customs. That is all President Obama was trying to do here. He DID commit one slight social faux pax. While the handshake is fairly common in Japan these days, the two gestures are not supposed to be combined. That's the the official "Miss Manners" etiquette book version. The reality is that these gestures are combined all the bloody time, especially when a nihonjin shakes hands with a foreigner.

Lastly (and this is the snarky version) have you ever seen the Emperor? The guy is tiny! And President Obama is 187cm (or 6 ft 1 in for the imperials out there). That's a few inches taller than me and I feel like a giant most of the time in this country. Obama probably needed to bow to the Emperor just so he could get a good look at him.


2. THE WAR IS OVER YOU DINGBATS!

The second major reason the outrage over this is asinine is the argument that the Emperor is the son of the man who bombed Pearl Harbor. So what? World War II is over. We won. Big time. Get over it!

The mere fact that your ancestors and mine used to be enemies is not a reason for me to be rude to you. By that logic Obama never should have met with, much less given a golden iPod to, the Queen of England because the United States was born from a couple of wars with England. Yes, I know the Conservative Party (and even a few of the Republicans) were P.O.'d over the iPod thing too. I don't care, it's still a valid point.

We must remember that the President is not only the head of the government, but the head of state for the United States. That means the the man is the personification and public face of the nation. In other words, President Obama has to represent what America is to the world. And making friends of former enemies is the highest ideal to which an immigrant nation like the USA can aspire.



3. BOTH SIDES REALLY NEEDED THIS PHOTO OP!


Obama needs to show himself making amends for America's past sins. And being an obnoxious tourist is one of them. Something I've noticed about the Japanese, they respect any effort foreigners make to fit in. Whether it be trying to speak the language, trying to follow the customs, or trying to act like anything other than the stereotypical tourist who flies 5000 miles and then asks where the nearest McDonald's is.

President Obama being shown and photographed trying to perform a traditional greeting to the spiritual leader of the nation will endear him in the hearts and minds of the population(remember, a large number of Japanese citizen remember when this man's father was a living God) and this will only serve to strengthen the bond between allies.


Besides, President Obama is the new international standard of what an American should be (a definite upgrade from Homer Simpson) adding "polite" and "at least he's trying" to the mix can only be a good thing.


On the other hand, this is a good thing for the imperial family as well. Barack Obama is the most popular figure in Japanese politics today. That should tell you something about the Japanese politicians who are, oh I don't know . . . Japanese! Seriously, you can walk into any bookstore in Japan and see dozens of Obama related books. Collections of his speeches, translations of books he's written, photo books, children's books staring his dog, the works. Not to mention the countless children who will happily exclaim "Yes we can!" despite not having the slightest clue what it means.


Compare this to Emperor Akihito who has recently made headlines by . . . having prostrate surgery.
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(Cue: Crickets)
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Oh, and he has an adorable granddaughter. And ducks. He's written some academic papers about ducks.

So the imperial family needed the type of coolness factor upgrade only the Obama-bump can provide. (Yes, I know the Obama-bump pales in comparison to the Colbert-bump, but you take what you can get.)

I know this is asking a lot, but ConservaTwits, will you PLEASE think before you open your mouths? From now on, I propose a three step process for deciding whether or not to attack the President on something. 1) Did it actually happen? 2) Can we prove it? 3) Can we b!$ch about it without looking stupid? If the answer to all three of these questions is "Yes" then go right ahead. If not, shut the hell up!

Until next time, I'm RyuSensei and I'm not kidding.