My Take on “The Bow”

Ok, so we’ve all seen “the photo.”

I’m gonna shock some folks by say­ing the fol­low­ing: I have no real issues with a Pres­i­dent of the United States of Amer­ica bow­ing to the Emperor of Japan.

How­ever…

The issue one should be won­der­ing, is this: Why the hell is he bow­ing so low?

I’m try­ing to draw back into my mem­ory banks from some old con­ver­sa­tions I’ve had with an old class­mate of mine (I believe he’s now a Min­is­ter at a Jehovah’s Wit­ness Tem­ple in the Twin Cities) who was born of an Amer­i­can mother and a Japan­ese father.  He told the class that in Japan, the depth of your bow sig­ni­fies where you stand in soci­ety.  His exam­ple was that stu­dents bow at the same length to each other, but a stu­dent bows lower when bow­ing to a teacher or elder.

In this case, Obama as Pres­i­dent of the United States, should only be doing a slight bow since he is of equal stature in soci­ety as the Japan­ese Emperor.  The bow as pic­tured makes it look like he’s a lowly bus­boy while meet­ing the feu­dal head of Japan.

Some­one in the White House’s cul­tural liai­son office botched this one and made their boss look like a fool.  They ought to be sacked for that.

(Or maybe they’ll be moved to another office and it will be called “a saved job” under the fed­eral stim­u­lus plan.)

Be Socia­ble, Share!

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