Obama’s bow in Japan sparks some criticism
Conservative commentators accuse president of groveling to foreign leader
updated 8:30 p.m. ET, Mon., Nov . 16, 2009
Read the article below and then debate the question that follows:
WASHINGTON - Some American conservative commentators are seizing on President Barack Obama's deep bow to Japan's emperor during the weekend, accusing the U.S. commander in chief of groveling to a foreign leader.
Obama greeted Emperor Akihito, whose father ruled when Japan bombed Pearl Harbor in 1941, with a simultaneous handshake and nearly 90-degree bow, sparking furious online commentary, much of it negative.
Obama's gesture on Saturday was not without precedent, however. Neither was the outrage.
U.S. presidents from both political parties often have been criticized for attempts at culturally sensitive greetings to high-ranking foreigners.
Former President George W. Bush, a Republican, was mocked for holding Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah's hand, a traditional sign of friendship in the Middle East, as they strolled together in 2005.
In 1994, former Democratic President Bill Clinton was criticized for almost bowing to Akihito. The resulting image, The New York Times wrote, was of "an obsequent president and the emperor of Japan."
Is Obama's bowing to foreign leader a show of respect or weakness? Support your answer.
The customs of greeting differ from region to region in america we usually shake hands when we meet someone. In Japan the proper thing is to bow when you meet someone as a sign of respect.
ReplyDeleteWhat Obama did was a sign of respect, he might also have possibly meant to set an image of America's people.
We must not forget to respect another nations or peoples customs and beliefs no matter how wrong we may think they are. >_<
ReplyDeletei agree with Cloaked Schemer its peoples customs and its not right to disrespect peoples customs and traditions
ReplyDeleteother presidents of america that have been to china and greeted them have all respected their customs, so it just shows a sign of respec to their culture and does not show anything to do with america "bowing" to china.
ReplyDeleteit does show weakness unless obama isnt doing by it by his will, you dont want to upset someone from going and being disrespectful. if the emporer were to come to the US he would shake hands. and heh who knows when obama bowed deeply he may have accidently gone too far
ReplyDeletehe is definatly bowing in respect. it is people who dont respect other people who get the united states in a mess if everyone was respectful to everyone else then nothing bad would really ever happen. even though this is not possible because human beings do not act like that and there is error in life but if obama didnt respct mr. Akihito then another attack like pearl harbor could break out. so just to be on the safe side and polite i think obama did the right thing.
ReplyDeleteWOW i can say after reading this i just got really freaking mad. where do some people get off like for real. if the president wants to show RESPECT he should. All he is doing is being the person that he was raised to be. which i think is a respectful man. Thats also shows that past presidents show respect to. i would also like to think that if someone else came here that they would be respectful also. So to say that that is a sign of weakness is dumb and you must not know anything about respect because if you went to go meet the president i am pretty sure you do whatever respectful greeting that is necessary!
ReplyDeleteI agree with cloaked schemer, we must not forget to respect other nations for they have a different culture than us. Thats not a bad thing thats just how it is. Obama bowing to the leader of china shows respect not weakness. I think that is a good thing too to show them that our leader wants to show them respect.
ReplyDeletei think it shows respect. differnt cultures do things differently. i dont get why ppl would take this as anything other than respect
ReplyDeletei agree with Cloaked Schemer when they said
ReplyDeleteWe must not forget to respect another nations or peoples customs and beliefs no matter how wrong we may think they are. i mean even if we dont agree we should still respect the other cultures and thats what obamma was doing
I think obamas bow is a sign of respect, i think this because of the cultural customs japan is used to. And if bowing is a sign of respect to japan then i think its the right thing.
ReplyDeletei agree with brockportkd18 because i really think people are taking this out of porportion basically,now if obama didnt bow i wonder what people would say then.
ReplyDeleteMy responce to this is what the heck. Why do people work up a tizy over things like this. i would understand if obama started bowing on his knees to the emperor but all he did was bow out of respect. and for all the people who said that bowing shows defeat and giving in, think about what would happen if we disrespect them and let them murdur all of us with unlimided moral.i would bow instead of geting my head choped off any day.
ReplyDeleteObamas bow was respect and a custom. simple as that
Peace
Obamas bow to the Japenese emperor was a sign of respect! Obama wasjust showing his respect to japan! I agree with Cloaked Schemer with what they said about how we cant disrespect the way of other nations, If we were to disrespect this nation it would just leave us in a bad situation!
ReplyDeleteI believe that Obama bowing to the emperor of Japan was a sign of respect.I think that if he didn't bow this would cause tension between the U.S and Japan and bowing just shows that the two are getting along. I think that it's also great that George w. Bush held the hand of prince Abdullah and I don't think there's anything wrong with it.
ReplyDeleteI think a handshake would have been enough respect. I don't think he needed to bow on top of it. A handshake is respectful enough. Bowing down is showing the other person is more important than you are. That's my feeling on it. I don't think what happened a long time ago should be a problem now (Pearl Harbor) but I don't think he should have bowed to him either. As for what Wee-gee said, just because he doesn't bow doesn't mean he's not showing respect and they are going to kill us for it. If that was true, then everyone who is mad over this is right and he is giving in and making America look weak.
ReplyDeleteObama's bow was nothing more than a greeting to Japan's leader. Obama was just respecting Japan's culture of bowing and thought it was necessary to do. He did not show a sign of weakness, he was only following Japanese traditions.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Wee-gee. What obama did was respect, and if he didn't show respect to the japanese leader our nation might have suffered for it. I would rather make peace with other nations than become their enemies.
ReplyDeleteI would say it is a sign of respect to the emperor of china. If he didn't they might have started a war or something over it and japan would become our enemy. Obama did it out repsect not saying we are weaker.
ReplyDeleteI agree with extreme9 that bowing was a respectful thing to do in that situation and people should realize that in most cases people who show respect will recieve respect and the U.S. does not need to get into any more wars instead we should be making allies.
ReplyDeleteI really like what tigerwoods#1 said about what would people say if he didnt bow. i thinks its so freaking true. it seems to me that someone cant do anything without someone having something stupid to say about it. but on the other hand people would get all freaked out if he didnt bow and its really sad that not only our president but any celebrity out there gets crap for doing or not doing something! but this also happens in our everyday life. i guess thats why people say you cant be perfect. because you got other people criticizing you all the time. and for over all i think everyone here agrees and think it was a sign of respect and not weakness which is cool
ReplyDeleteI agree with wee-gee with how they said that without showing the japan emperor our respect our nation might suffer in the end. Obama was just showing his respect for japan, nothing more!
ReplyDeleteI think that President Obama is showing respect to Japan's Emperor Akihito because that is what they do in that culture.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Name13 because if was not Japan's tradition, President Obama would not have bowed. He would have shook hands or whatever the respectful thing is in that culture.
ReplyDeleteI believe that Obama was very respectful to Emperor Akihito. If we want to have peace with other countries then we need to have respect and if we respect them they will respect us.
ReplyDeleteI disagree with creature54 but i know we all have opinions. I think if obama had just done a handshake that it would be impolite.I look at as a sense of laws , like if you go into another state they have different laws then other states.And people have different customs as well . Ithink obama was at the highest respect towards the japanese emperor and i think that obama was correct to bow to the emperor as a sense of greeting.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with "Name13" because Obama bowed for respect.. Im sure he wouldnt want soemone to come up to him and treat him badly and disrespect his culture. Its all a matter of respect.
ReplyDeleteThen again.. I also see the other side on how someone might think that Obama is showing weakness.. It all depends on how you look at it.. The sign of weakness could be he is bowing like a peasant to an emperor.
ReplyDeleteI think obama's bowing towards a foreign leader is a sign of weakness because it shows that our country looks up to their country in a more powerfull way.
ReplyDeletei agree with cloaked schemer
ReplyDeletethe y are right about having to respect other nation, if you dont something could happen just because you used the wrong way of saying hello
obama's bow to the emperor is a sign of respect he did so to show he has no intension of disrespecting his culture.
ReplyDeleteIf obamas bow to the emperor is a sign of weakness then then as panda_lover said a peasant bowing to a emperor
ReplyDeleteWell, I guess I am in the minority but I think he took it a little to far. I understand the custom to be that the "lesser class" bows lower. So is the president less important to the leader of Japan. Did the president bow to the Queen of England? Our custom is all people are created equal. A small bow would have been more than enough sign of respect.
ReplyDeleteI think that obama bowing to the japanese emperor is a sign of respect because it shows that america respects and tolerates the japanese culture.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Name13 because they thought of the president bowing to the emperor as as only a greeting and not a sign of weakness
ReplyDeletei think that obamas bowing to japan is a sign of respect. obama would not have shown that our country is weak. if he had done so we would of been in worse shape that we already are with the japanese.
ReplyDeletei agree with twilight18eclipse95 because we need to be respected by the world so we dont start a war
ReplyDeleteI think that bowing to Emperor Akihito was a sign of respect and had nothing to do with weakness. As we saw through his whoel campaign to be president and even now he has a lot of respect for everyone, only if you do something that is against our country then you will most likely see another side of him as for everyone you would. I think it was smart of him to bow to the Emperor because he could have something up his sleeve on for them to pay us back or join forces with them against a country that could be thinking about doing something against the United States.
ReplyDeleteHim bowing was deffently a show of respect...Thats how they greet in japan...saying hes showing weakness would be the same as the presedent of japan coming to the US and shaking Obamas hand, then trying to say the presedent of japan is showing weakness to the US/Obama...no itsjust a sign of respect
ReplyDeletei agree with creature5 a handshake would be enough to show respect
ReplyDeletei that is was a sign of weakness because it was like he was submiting to the emperor of japan and like creature5 said a handshake should be enough
ReplyDeletei agree with name 13 because he was just greeting him out of respect to their culture. if he did not do it he might not be as respected as he is.
ReplyDeletei think that obamas bow was a sign of respect and kindness. i dont think that the bow represented a weakness at all i actaully think people are ridicilous for eevn thinking that.
ReplyDeletei believe that obama trying to be respectful but wht he really was doing was showing weakness for america and his postion by bowing because in japan when u bow to some one it shows submistion
ReplyDeleteObama defintely wasn't showing any weakness to Japan's Emperor. He was showing him some respect. Since when did those two get mixed up?? lol. I think the conservative commentators who commented on Obama's bow to Akihito should of thought about what they said about this event.
ReplyDeletei think that obamma was not in the wrong in bowing because he wa just trying to show respect to the mans culture.. there is nothing wrong with that. its like saying smiling or giving someone a hug here is wrong
ReplyDeletei agree with bubblegum in the fact that she said everyone does tings differnetly because who are we to judge how others show respect?? Its not like wee any better than they are so i think obamma bowing was not wrong AT ALL
ReplyDeleteI believe that when president Obama bowed it was a sign of respect. It would be disrespectful if he didn't bow, just like it would be disrespectful in the United States if a person from a different country didn't shake our president's hand.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Twilight18Eclipse95 because in order for other countries to respect you, you need to respect them as well. And in this case, bowing was a sign of respect.
ReplyDeleteIt shows respect not weakness because America is not bowing down to china, we are just showing respect by bowing. same as if a china leader or president was to come to america he would shake obamas hand.
ReplyDeletei agree with james1995 because its just showing a sign of respect as if someone shakes our hand in america it shows respect or a greeting
ReplyDeletei agree with jessica because obama was just trying to do the respectful thing and didn't want to show america as disrespectful.
ReplyDeleteI think that Obama was trying to be respectful to the forgein leader. Many people say americans are rude so if our leader displays respect to other leaders it will represent our country and show we have still 'class'.
ReplyDeletebut also obama probably would have been better off just shaking his hand rather than bowing because being the president he must have thought the act would cause some people to take it out of proportion. but in the end him bowing turned out to be a little bit of both.
ReplyDeletei disagree with wipeout176 because their wouldn't have been a war even if oboma didnt bow down to show respect to another foreign leader.
ReplyDeletei agree with james1995 because as well because that president Obama is showing world respect and honor for the united states comming together , and for being united into one.
ReplyDelete