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You're beginning to sound like a New York Times essayist.
Taking the smallest thing and spinning it off into some sort of...insight.
Maybe it's time to leave the crib and bite the Big Apple.
Frankly, I am liking seeing some humility in a politician.
Given these cultural expectations, when a man does cry, however, people notice, and sometimes making an exception to that rule can work in a man's favor. As I see it, Obama's shedding a few tears after a winning campaign showed the warm and compassionate side of a man who has been labeled cool and distant.
P.S. Try getting a little watery eyed during a particularly bad fight with your girl sometime, and her cold she-devil heart will instantly become soft and warm.
It disturbs me that you aren't reading this right. Also what philosophy is he abandoning by crying in this way? You're aware of recent research on crying I'm sure that shows that it strengthens social bonds?
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/200…
The President of the United States should not be a weepy pussy.
http://www.thestranger.com/slog/archives…
Firstly, the man had to be exhausted. Emotions run much closer to the surface when you're exhausted and you have a greatly diminished capacity for containing them at such times.
Secondly, he was speaking, not in public per se, but to his campaign workers. As in, this was a more personal moment than a stump speech or a victory speech. He was with family, basically.
Thirdly, these are not wailing grief tears like your Roman politician. These are tears of gratitude, relief, and exhaustion (see above).
Fourthly, just... no. Unlike the Rmoneybot, our President is a real human being. Real human beings occasionally leak a salty fluid from their eye-ports. This is a good thing, and not, for instance, a sign of weakness. You are in fact verging on chauvinism when you express discomfort at the sight of a man leaking salty eye-fluid.
Fifthly, expert trolling with this post, expert. We would expect nothing less from you. And yes, that is a compliment.
If you are going to re-use stuff you wrote as a teenager, at least cite yourself. Repeatedly. In the head.
I doubt if anyone would ever cry for you in that way.
Obama also wept at his last speech of the 2012 campaign, in Iowa; he wept at the funeral of a civil rights pioneer who perished recently; he wept in 2008 after his grandmother died; and he wept here. All were moments of finality, junctures where a long struggle, relationship, or exercise in "philosophy building" of some sort had come to an end.
I think you can build a pretty compelling case that his displays of emotion don't happen in moments where he's called on to articulate or execute a "philosophy" or worldview, but that he does so in the in-between moments where philosophy falls short or is extraneous. The life of the mind has its place and the last thing you could accuse Obama of is underestimating it; there's room in this world for embodiment as well.
This seems like the intellectual's equivalent of The Birther Movement; no display of rationality, of focus, of self-control is good enough to deflate a character judgement with a social slant; in the same way that piece of proof can over-power a strange name and dark skin. While we're urging others to become philosophers, here's the argument by way of syllogism:
Obama's Law Degree and Record As Commander And Chief
IS TO
Charles' Opinion Of Him In This Case
WHAT
Obama's Long-form Birth Certificate
IS TO
The Birther Movement.
In any case, where, exactly, does the distinction between feeling and thinking--between crying and philosophizing--come from? Certainly not The Blues: if the black musical tradition has taught us anything, it's that cold criticality of an absurd world or of trying circumstances can be done with a plaintive wail. It isn't like we can't look to better examples of how to conduct our selves than Roman emperors.
(I saw that movie BTW, it didn't end well.)
"For the moment, let's suspend the temptation to laugh when someone calls into question the rational, intellectual, or philosophical capacity of a constitutional lawyer and former president of the Harvard Law Review who once delivered one-liners to an unwitting audience the same weekend he privately knew he'd have to watch Osama bin Laden be executed.
Obama also wept at his last speech of the 2012 campaign, in Iowa; he wept at the funeral of a civil rights pioneer who perished recently; he wept in 2008 after his grandmother died; and he wept here. All were moments of finality, junctures where a long struggle, relationship, or exercise in "philosophy building" of some sort had come to an end.
I think you can build a pretty compelling case that his displays of emotion don't happen in moments where he's called on to articulate or execute a "philosophy" or worldview, but that he does so in the in-between moments where philosophy falls short or is extraneous. The life of the mind has its place and the last thing you could accuse Obama of is underestimating it; there's room in this world for embodiment as well.
This seems like the intellectual's equivalent of The Birther Movement; no display of rationality, of focus, of self-control is good enough to deflate a character judgement with a social slant; in the same way that piece of proof can over-power a strange name and dark skin. While we're urging others to become philosophers, here's the argument by way of syllogism:
Obama's Law Degree and Record As Commander And Chief
IS TO
Charles' Opinion Of Him In This Case
WHAT
Obama's Long-form Birth Certificate
IS TO
The Birther Movement.
In any case, where, exactly, does the distinction between feeling and thinking--between crying and philosophizing--come from? Certainly not The Blues: if the black musical tradition has taught us anything, it's that cold criticality of an absurd world or of trying circumstances can be done with a plaintive wail. It isn't like we can't look to better examples of how to conduct our selves than Roman emperors. "
I think men crying should be encouraged.
Neitzsche said: "From the smile of that Dionysos the Olympian gods were born, from his tears human beings." Tears are what we are made of, Charles. They show our humanity, when what it inside leaks out and cannot be contained by hollow social norms.
You should try leaking someday, from somewhere other than your ass.
Huh, Mr Mudede, so tears are a no-go for you ? Why ?
Tears are normal human reactions to strong emotions. Tears of happiness do happen, you know ? Should all emotions be banned, a la Romney ? I don't think so. Cool people do have tears.
@16 I was with you until your PS. Faking tears in a fight, now, that's lame. I expected better from you.
Men crying is not a problem. People that feel they shouldn't ever cry are the problem.
GET OVER IT MAN!
If he was crying for some of the people he wants to rob of their "entitlements" (e.g., seniors and the poor) or some of the civilians he's droned to death, I'd feel some empathy.