Being a political science major, the first thing I immediately clicked on in the list of links Professor Hanrahan posted was the by Heather Leighton about the memes of the SOTU. Upon viewing some of the memes insulting and bashing President Obama, the phrase “Obama’s a dictator!” was brought to my mind. Although I am a supporter of President Obama on most issues, my disdain for the memes insulting and mindlessly bashing the president truly have nothing to do with the fact that I agree with him on most issues. The simple fact is, regardless of whether or not anyone agrees with President Obama’s stance on issues or the policies he’s put forth as president, the statement that he is a dictator is not accurate to reality. It is very frustrating to me to watch almost every single one of the Republican presidential candidates, for example, repeatedly and belligerently proclaim on live television during debates that President Obama is a dictator. And it is frustrating because if President Obama truly was a dictator, they all would have been thrown in jail months ago for constantly insulting the president through every media outlet possible. That’s how a dictatorship works; if someone speaks out too harshly against the “dictator,” if a politician blatantly insults the dictator on live television, they are stopped by the dictator’s regime. None of that has happened, of course, because President Obama is by definition not a dictator. Just because a large group of politicians and Americans disagree with our President’s policies does not magically qualify him as a dictator, and the downright disrespectful memes about the SOTU reminded me of this issue. I apologize if my post was a little strong for a first post, but seeing so many disrespectful memes after watching the Republican debate last night and hearing almost all of them basically call President Obama a dictator, I was reminded of this absurd phrase that is so frequently thrown around.
I agree with you on the point that Obama clearly isn't a dictator, you can clearly see an example of a dictator by taking a look at North Korea. I am confused as to why people would call someone a name while they are ignorant in regards to what the term actually means. There is a good chance that the unintelligent masses are simply repeating a phrase said by another person, lacking any thought in what they are actually saying.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you saying that President Obama is not a dictator, he doesn't 'make' us doing anything. Just because we don't like what policies he's implementing doesn't mean we're not under a democracy.
ReplyDeleteI think that the fact that we are even allowed to have the freedom to call our own president a dictator says a lot about the way our actual government is set up. So I get it when Daniela says that those ignorant people calling him a dictator should maybe look up the definition before they say what’s on their mind. But what gets to me is that people use this freedom of speech to bash whoever they want, and I think that this is wrong. This may be a naive way of seeing the world, but I think the internet should be used to help people, share funny things, or somehow get information out (positive information). It shouldn’t be used in such a negative way, yet it is. So what does that say about us as a society?
ReplyDeleteThis reminds me of the TED Talks that we watched in our first class. The masses, with little or no knowledge of the subject, want to become a part of the discussion. This could be considered one of the downsides of technology today, with uninformed people being able to voice their opinions and be spread across the world in one click.
ReplyDeleteI don't think that a lot of our society realizes how much freedom we truly have. I, too, agree with much of what President Obama has said over his past 8 years in office, though I know that doesn't mean that others will as well. But that doesn't mean they should make disrespectful comments and refer to him as something he is quite far from.
ReplyDeleteHonestly you have such a good point here and I honestly believe that the roots of these statements are racism. If a white president had done anything similar to what Barack Obama has been doing, no one would have correlated the word 'Dictator' to him. They would go to their next generic insult, which would be that he is a socialist (the horror!).
ReplyDelete[Comment from Jessica Friend; I am posting on her behalf. -Dr. H] "No I don't think Obama is a dictator. There are so many rumors about Obama as President. Some say he is a terrible President, others say he is amazing. In my opinion, the president doesn't have much power, but the President is a huge symbol to Americans. In a video recently posted on Facebook in regards to Trump, three little girls are singing and dancing to a song almost the same tune as the song in the interview for Kim Jong-un, and I just thought that was very interesting, and I was wondering if anyone else had seen this video."
ReplyDeleteMore good discussion here, everyone! We should (at some point) talk about memes as a genre. They are very effective at distilling a single idea into an image, but they also leave out any room for nuance, right?
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