Monday, March 23, 2009

Obama's "Special" Comment

Last Thursday when Barack Obama appeared on The Tonight Show, he said something he probably shouldn’t have.



What a lot of the criticism seems to be (from YouTube comments anyway) is that if Bush had said what Obama said about the Special Olympics, there would be so many complaints and he would be impeached and blah blah blah.

Well, guess what? Obama isn’t Bush and people are still complaining. And considering the things Bush has done and said during his 8 year reign, what’s a comment like that gonna do? Besides, there’s a reason we know exactly what Bushisms are.

Oddly enough, it looks like Obama fans don’t really care about his Special Olympics comment, whereas Obama haters (and who I think must be Bush lovers) do - not to mention everyone involved with the Special Olympics.

Let me just get it out there so there's no confusion: I'm a way bigger fan of Obama than Bush, so I'm going to defend Obama now by saying he made a mistake. Everyone makes mistakes, right? (It's not like he invaded a country or anything.)

Then again, I guess not everyone says insulting, prejudiced things on Leno, and obviously not everyone is the President of the United States - who based his entire campaign on Change no less. But Obama’s strategy from the beginning was to present himself as this regular, everyday person in America who everday people could identify with.

Is he just continuing on with that strategy, acting like the average Joe by unwittingly saying things that could offend people? (One of the big ones that comes to mind, and one I’m sure most of us has said at least once and heard at least a hundred times, is “that’s so gay.”) That said, is he just making an example out of himself?

Do you think the Special Olympics comment will affect Obama’s image?
Were you upset by his comment?
Do you even think it’s a big deal?

Will “Obamaisms” become the new thing? (If they do, I bet one of them would be, "We are facing a time of crisis." Not that he's wrong; he just seems to say it a lot.)

8 comments:

  1. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I deleted my earlier comment to fix some grammatical errors.

    I thought it was much worse than this from the way people were making it sound.

    Has anybody seen Russell Peters video about "retarded people" (direct quote). Or "Indians"? The difference is, he's a comedian, so is that why people excuse him? Maybe Obama should double as one, so then he could get away from the hail of bullets people fire from their guns all the time. Oh oops. I just made a clever stereotype/generalization about Americans there!

    Honestly. Are people losing sleep over this? Get a life. Everyone has said something like this at some point in their lives. Why aren't people making videos about me using: "Oh that's gay", to express a situation is bad?

    Anyway, good post Laur.

    Nick
    (flavourfiasco.blogspot.com)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Thanks Nick.

    I didn't really think about the comedian thing before, but it's true. I'm pretty sure one episode of Family Guy or South Park could offend five different groups of people, but people must like the offensiveness because those shows are still on.

    I think most of the "bullets," as you nicely put it, are coming from people who have already decided they don't like Obama...maybe even using this as an excuse to make him look bad (which would be an even bigger insult to the differently abled than what Obama said if you ask me).

    ReplyDelete
  4. Like you said, after what Bush has said and done in the past, this was just a minor accidental slip of the tongue. He was obviously not thinking about or considering those who may have a disability in his nation.
    It does not excuse what he said, but at least he apologized for it, and I'm sure that he will speak a lot more carefully the next time he is on a talk show!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Hi Laur,

    This post is very thought-provoking and has obviously stimulated much interested among our fellow classmates. Would you mind if I re-posted it to my blog? The awkward nature of Obama's comment would have a special place on blog awkward!

    Thanks,
    Julie-Anne
    blogawkward.blogspot.com

    ReplyDelete
  6. Sure! His comment would definitely fit in with all things awkward on your blog.

    ReplyDelete
  7. thanks so much! you can view it here:
    http://blogawkward.blogspot.com/2009/03/laur-lore-tackles-obamas-special.html

    ReplyDelete
  8. Great site loved it alot, will come back and visit again

    ReplyDelete