Klavan On The Culture

October 12th, 2009 9:30 am

At the Ministry of Silly Prizes

The fatuousness of the Nobel committee’s Peace Prize award to President Obama cannot, of course, be held against Obama himself. He didn’t campaign for it or claim to be worthy of it, whatever “worthy” might mean in regards to an honor so degraded by ideology. And when he won it, he did what any politician would’ve done – what I would’ve done in his position – tried to put it to use to further his agenda. Fair enough.

But that a group of presumably serious individuals convinced themselves that they might give such an award to a man who has accomplished nothing but the winning of elections does indeed say something about Obama’s role in their lives and the lives of people like them. It shows that they regard him as an empty vessel that they have filled with their political hopes and dreams–that they know he’s such a vessel and that they’re comfortable with that. This means, if you follow the logic, that the committee has essentially presented the Peace Prize to themselves, to their own feelings and aspirations. Thus, this year’s Nobel Peace Prize is, in effect, the ultimate expression of leftism: it’s people giving themselves an enormous pat on the back for their own excellent intentions without regard to results.

I can’t help but draw a direct link from this to a hilarious comment made recently by movie mogul Harvey Weinstein in his defense of child sodomist and film director Roman Polanski. “Hollywood has the best moral compass,” Weinstein unforgettably proclaimed, “because it has compassion.” Here too, as with the Nobel folks, a liberal confuses a feeling state with virtue.

As a result of such confusion, the disasters leftism has relentlessly unleashed on the weak and poor of the world don’t count for anything because the feelings behind them are beneficent and therefore good. They kill millions in the name of saving the earth, destroy families and neighborhoods in the fight against racism and sexism, crush our educational system in the cause of diversity–but they care so much and mean so well, how can they be anything but in the right? And how can anyone who opposes them be anything but mean or greedy or racist?

I am reminded of the marvelous book After Virtue by Alasdair MacIntyre in which the author proposes that we live in a world that continues to use the language of morality but has lost its comprehension, both theoretical and practical, of what, in fact, morality is. It is in precisely such a world that people rush to the defense of child rapists and award high prizes to do-nothings: a madcap cartoon world of men and women with buttocks where their heads should be, sick with silliness, all of them, maybe even unto death.

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19 Comments

1. Professor Guvinoff:

Secularists in general and atheists in particular claim to have as much moral sense as religious individuals, but they never acknowledge the origin of their morality. You have to go back to Jean-Jacques Rousseau to attribute an automatic inner sense of goodness to the human spirit, and therefore assume that morality just pops out, by spontaneous generation.

If it was so, there would be such a thing as universal morality, some kind of spiritual corollary of shared genome. Today, when we talk about culture, most of the time we get mired in vain dissertations on abstract art or whatnot. But culture is not what we create today, it is the inheritance of what was created earlier, and there is no unifying culture, only competing cultures, with contrasting codes of morality. There is a Christian morality, and there is an Islamic morality, and the overlap between the two is very small when compared to the fundamental differences.

Forget about universal culture and universal morality, these are abstract concepts that have not materialized, and are not likely to do so anytime soon.

What does a peace prize mean to a citizen of the Honduras who has to fight Obama’s posture in addition to fight his own candidate to despotism, or an Iranian citizen hoping to shake the shackles of islamic theocracy? What has the recipient of the glorious prize done for them? Where are they going to see the peace in the peace prize?

If we have any appreciation for culture, we need to recognize that the criteria on which the Nobel peace prize is awarded are both provincial and opportunistic, and they do not advance to cause of world peace, because there is not such a thing outside of fairy tales.

Come to think of it, there is not much of such a thing inside fairy tales, either.

Oct 12, 2009 - 10:34 am 2. Bob A:

The one thing they all have in common is they all hate the US. That is until their worthless butts are threatened.

Its time to ban all travel from Norway. These leftists are pretty secure. No one else in the whole world wants anything to do with that frozen tundra.

Oct 12, 2009 - 12:29 pm 3. raba raba:

professor gusinoff:

how do you propose we handle our fundemental differences with islam? is it possible to coexists? do we have fundemental differences with buddism, or taoism or pagenism and can we handle those? not tryig to be a wiseguy just want to know you views on this.

Oct 12, 2009 - 12:47 pm 4. Butch:

Prof. I think you have a misunderstanding, outside of Christianity, all other religions and philosophies count on your good works. Whis are never sufficent or obtainable. As Jesus said, no one is good not one.
What does a Jew do when he can’t keep the law of Moses? What does a Muslem do when he can’t keep the Five Pillars? What does a humanists or a member of a secret society do when they see that thay can’t do what is required of them Or environmental pundents who jet around the world leaving their carbon foot print?

Oct 12, 2009 - 1:53 pm 5. AtheistConservative:

I don’t think the position of “Obama isn’t to blame” holds water.

You’re not to blame if someone tries to give you stolen money. You are to blame if you accept it.

Obama accepted this award. That means he is most certainly to blame, because his colossal ego is all that matters. For him, everything exists to give him more power, to aggrandize him, to reflect his glory.

This explains why people are attracted to him. To the sad, self-doubting, unhappy person – AKA the general leftist – the narcissist is the strongest draw.

Oct 12, 2009 - 1:54 pm 6. Klavan On The Culture » At the Ministry of Silly Prizes « Snow Report Blog:

[...] via Klavan On The Culture » At the Ministry of Silly Prizes. [...]

Oct 12, 2009 - 1:57 pm 7. batb (been around the block):

Obama’s being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize is the ultimate in dumbing down.

Wouldn’t it have been the noble (NOT Nobel) thing to do, to refuse to accept it? I know that turning down accolades isn’t in his DNA, but what happened to the oft’ vaunted “choice” the leftards revere?

Oct 12, 2009 - 2:15 pm 8. ReaderRedux:

How do we know that he didn’t campaign for the Nobel?

Oct 12, 2009 - 2:39 pm 9. jsburke:

The great liberal, rule utilitarian 19th-century philosopher and moralist J.S. Mill would weep at the misappropriation of the term compassion by modern liberals. Compassion is not encouraging gross selfishness and the pursuit of base pleasures, nor is it the appropriation of wealth for the purpose of redistributing it to the poor. Compassion is seeking to establish equal justice under the law, compassion is freedom and liberty for all so that all may seek to improve their circumstances within the law, and compassion is when those that have achieved success serve as an example and encourage others to strive for similar heights of achievement.

Oct 12, 2009 - 2:57 pm 10. Wes:

I think it’s time to see this entire affair for what it is: the perverse and degrading internationalization of ‘Affirmative Action’.
Andrew is correct to point out that Obama himself cannot be held accountable for this farce yet his complicity cannot be totally ignored. Having benefited from (and subsequently promoted) such a policy his entire life he is sadly unable to recognize the sordid end to all such schemes.

Oct 12, 2009 - 3:11 pm 11. raba raba:

i think the the peace prize was really given to the america people for voting the bush administration out of office. obama just happened to be the guy we elected. it would have been given to hilery clinton, edwards or mccain if they had been elceted. after all, i am sure europe believes caused iran to beome a much much bigger threat to the world by knocking off their arch enemy, saddam husein. no county in the arab world now has the force to hold iran in check. iran having to fight off saudia arabia, egypt, jordan or any other arab country. they are unleashed.

that coupled with the economic disaster bush caused and his refusal to cooperate with the world on issues such as global warming, made the whole world (especially our allies)so delirious with joy that we voted him out that they would have given the prize to anyone we elcted president.

Oct 12, 2009 - 4:30 pm 12. Maggio Slooter:

Good one, Andrew. The Pythons could have done a wonderful sketch about this.

Oct 12, 2009 - 5:05 pm 13. Margot:

raba raba:
You hit the nail on the head with your choice of words, “delirious”.

Oct 12, 2009 - 8:23 pm 14. raba raba:

margot, #13:

that was easy, huh! one snappy comment and out. tell me more about why the whole world in conspiring against the neocon/religous right in this country. do you think swede’s/world knows or cares who you are? give me some of clear logical thinking the right always claims to have. your comment is the most clear and logical i have seen in this discussion, so please, go on.

Oct 13, 2009 - 8:51 am 15. starling:

Filed under category “Also Immune to Obama’s Charm”

“In the UK there is a stronger feeling that Obama did not deserve the prize, with sixty two per cent of voters taking this view. The comparable proportion in the US was fifty two per cent.” http://bit.ly/3QFZNk

And then there’s this: “Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize: The World Reacts”
http://www.theepochtimes.com/n2/content/view/23747/

Sweden, By Pirjo Svensson
In Sweden, reactions reflected sentiments of surprise, controversy, approval and being premature.

Russia, By Bohdan Skorbach

According to Vestee TV in Russia, Liberal Democratic Party leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky, sent a letter to the White House asking the U.S. President to return the Prize, believing the decision to be an act of provocation. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev offered congratulations, reported Russian media.

Germany, By Nina Hamrle
German Chancellor Angela Merkel welcomed the news saying, “Obama has set a new tone in the world,” reported Bild. Spiegel-Magazin and Sueddeutsche newspaper, two of Germany’s leading media, criticized the decision, the latter calling it “messiah-mania” and asked if the Nobel jury has lost their senses. The Spiegel argued that Obama hasn’t brought change, and only made things worse, for example in Afghanistan, Iran, and the Middle-East.

Slovakia, By Peter Sedik

In two readers’ polls in Slovakia, one by the main right-wing paper, the SME Daily, the other by the online news server aktualne.sk, 12 percent and 16 percent of respondents respectively felt that Obama deserved the prize.

Bulgaria, By Kremena Krumova
The article likened this year’s choice to 1994 when Yaser Arafat—“a terrorist and murderer”—won. The newspaper appealed to the Nobel Committee to “stop doing politics” or the Prize would lose its reputation in the public eye.

I could go on but let me save you the effort. There’s a very notable pattern. The leaders of the world send their formal congratulations. The official and mainstream press organs in many-but not all-cases echo that line. The independent media and the general public are scratching their heads and having a collective “WTF!?” moment.

So, raba raba, if the prize is given for not being Bush, then why such deep skepticism from the rest of the world? Maybe it’s because those 5 Norwegians only speak for those 5 Norwegians and not “the world.”

Oct 13, 2009 - 3:28 pm 16. raba raba:

starling

1st your sources. the epoch times is apparently from china and is an anti chinese goverment paper (wikpedia). and apparently has a very poor reputation for accurate reporting. bit.li/…has been around since last year. i didnt have time to really check them out so i dont know about theri repuation for honesty etc., but i did see there is an american cite with the same name that is published by fox.
as for your other cites, i dont know anything about them except you indicate they are not part of the main stream media at least one is right wing european paper (hmmm….). how conveniet for you. if you dont like the news, you can yell that its from the drive by media and cherry pick the sources you want.

but it dosnt matter. its your wtf moment, and maybe you should consider how far out of touch with reality you are. you are right that obama is still brand new and we wil have to wait to see what he can really accomplish. but that is exactly the point! the world was so happy to get rid of bush and his “i am a 900 pound gorilla so f.u. i’ll do what i want” approach, that the 5 norwegians voted him the peace prize. the thing obama did do was give the world/our allies, hope that the united states would once again behave as a civilized nation and reassume role as leader of the free world. its pretty clear those norwegians did reflect the attitude of the civilized world.

Oct 14, 2009 - 7:06 am 17. Daniel:

I like the recollection of MacIntyre’s After Virtue. It is one of the few, good, and contemporary books on moral/political theory. And it pretty much says America and the West are doomed by their acceptance of subjective morality. Well then, better find a good community soon!

Oct 14, 2009 - 1:39 pm 18. Buck:

I view the matter of the education system and this issue of “diversity” as nothing more than another precisely planned and executed effort at undermining our society.

I mean, if history has shown us nothing else it’s that an ideology cannot successfully be pushed upon a nation by brute force. Granted, Mao and his merry band of men pretty much got away with it, but anyhow … it makes more sense to be patient, to methodically infiltrate a nation’s media, arts/entertainment, and education systems and re-educate until everything’s been flipped completely upside down.

WAIT! Somebody else already thought about all of that a long, long time ago, didn’t they???? If Antonio Gramsci could only see how thoroughly and completely his brain-child was unfolding even better than could have hoped or prayed for … oops … nix the praying part, I suppose, few have held as high a contempt for the idea of God than he … but I digress …

It must almost sound as if I am endorsing the late Senator McCarthy. Well, I hate to subject myself to the verbal onslaughts of the hopelessly feckless, but yeah … there’s no denying now that Joe was clearly onto something, To deny that he handled certain matters poorly would be as monumentally ignorant as denying that the McCarthy debacle solidified the media’s place as the strong-armed enforcer of the extreme left.

But who am I to say anything about any of this? I’m simply just another one of those evil, deranged parents who encourages his children to “breath the poisoned air of nationalism.”

Sorry if I seem to have drifted off-topic! I actually didn’t, though … as the years go by (and I’ve only been around smallish star that warms our planet a mere four and one half decades now) it becomes increasingly more difficult to brush aside as paranoid or implausible the notion that the United Nations may very well be the establishment and institution from which the whirlwind of social dysfunction that has befallen our great nation this past near-century arose. If not, it seems perfectly clear that they are the current heir apparent for the puppet king’s throne.

Oct 24, 2009 - 9:58 am 19. vesey:

raba raba and the others can argue back and forth all they want,but for me the Nobel Peace Prize lost it’s relevance when Arafat won and has simply confirmed that sense of irelavance when obama won. it has the same legitimacy to me as Barry Bonds holding the home run record: NONE………

Nov 12, 2009 - 1:34 pm