By Mel O’Brien
Body language amongst world leaders is a subject that crops up occasionally in the media. Angela Merkel has been unimpressed by inappropriate physical advances from both George W. Bush and Nicolas Sarkozy; Kevin Rudd has been chided for giving a deputy sheriff salute to George W. Bush. It was with great interest this morning that I watched the footage of the meeting of the Obamas and the Browns at 10 Downing St prior to the G20 summit in London.
Clearly, the Obamas are far more media friendly. They appeared relaxed and smiling. In the photo op in front of No. 10, the Obamas had their arms around each other; while the Browns stood stiffly apart. The Obamas wave with their outside hands, while Gordon Brown was almost waving his hand in front of his wife’s face, drawing a clear separation between himself and his wife. In a photo op inside, Michelle Obama put out her arm to put it around Sarah Brown, who refused to step in next to the First Lady. Walking around, Obama put his arm on Brown’s shoulders, who did not reciprocate this attempt at breaching formalities.
Michelle Obama had a wonderful, dazzling smile on in all footage, whether with all four or just with Sarah Brown. Sarah Brown, on the other hand, looked strained and struggled to manage a half-smile even for photo opportunities. In fact, she looked like she would much rather be somewhere else.
I found this all very interesting because it showed not only a stark contrast between the Obamas and the Browns, but between Americans and British in general. There was a warmth, welcomeness, and willingness to dispense with formality radiating from the Obamas. In contrast, the Browns were retaining the stiff upper lip and formal, distant attitude that the Brits are so well-known for. As a native of a country that prefers to reject formality and a resident in the UK for almost 4 years now, I would love to see the leaders of this country break away from this stiffness. I know the British can be much warmer in certain circumstances! The Obamas appear inherently more approachable than the Browns. Even though Obama is the President of the USA, you do not get that sense of hierarchy from his demeanour. This is, of course, a significant part of his popularity. Obama comes across as someone most people could relate to and approach. Brown, in contrast, gives the impression that he could only be contacted through his deputies and lives a life apart from the average person. While these aspects are demonstrated in so many different ways, I did find it fascinating that they are also evident in something as casual as a photo op at the Prime Minister’s residence.
People do not realise it but body language gives away a lot about a person
“Michelle Obama did touch the Queen on the back, a reciprocation to the same gesture made by the Queen herself, which is perfectly within ‘royal etiquette’. Buckingham Palace has denied there are any rules about touching the Queen. She may be the Queen, but she is just another person, when it comes down to it.”
Sorry, I was wrong. It wasn’t the president but the First Lady who did the groping. But whatever.
So according to your logic it can’t be wrong because the radiating Michelle O. did it and the queen grinned and bore it.
What option, pray tell, would the queen have had save to grin and bear it? Specifically in this case. Can you imagine the outcries of “racism” had the old lady shown the slightest little hint of being taken aback? The Obamas violate, deliberately or carelessly, any rule of protocol, etiquette and simple decency and good manners and get away with it. Can you imagine the reactions had Laura Bush groped the octogenarian monarch?
It is the same logic that allows radiating Michelle O. hypocritically whine in front of English schoolgirls about how underprivileged she was and how hard she had to work to become “America’s first black First Lady”, when she is a textbook example of a woman privileged by affirmative action.
That cheek!
And royal protocol DOES forbid touching the queen (or any member of the royal family, for that) as much as you may dislike the thought and whatever Buckingham Palace (whose dwellers ARE polite) may say now. The radiating, approachable Obamas have forced one of the oldest and noblest institutions in Europe to lie. What an achievement!
The Queen of England is not “just another person”. When it comes down to it, she represents the English people. One doesn’t bow and curtsy to that little old woman with execrable dress sense, Elizabeth Battenberg, but to the people she represents. That said, one doesn’t grope ANY head of state.
But fine, let’s for argument’s sake assume that the queen IS just a person like everybody else. I think, and I am not alone in this, that plain good manners forbid to grope a much older person with whom one is not on intimate terms. Whom will the radiating Michelle grope next? The pope? He is, after all, just another old man only waiting to be introduced to the American idea of approachability and cutesy informality.
America was founded by people who tried to get away from the burden with with the corporative state lumbers its subjects, a noble achievement if I have ever seen one. But there is no reason to feel superior to us Europeans based on the sad travesty of equality your country has become, and whose citizens confuse bad manners with informality and can’t distinguish a shark bearing its teeth from a “radiating smile”.
Sir, may I ask you the following: Where Mr. Gordon Brown should have posted his outside hand? Directly into the face of Mr. Barack Obama, or in front of Mr. Obama’s hand or behind it?
He was forced to wave his right hand, otherwise …
And as far as Mrs. Michelle Obama is concerned, you like this kind of smile? Are you kidding?
Editrix,
Yes it IS my interpretation- I never said it wasn’t.
I am also not aware of any incident of an American president “groping” the Queen of England. Michelle Obama did touch the Queen on the back, a reciprocation to the same gesture made by the Queen herself, which is perfectly within ‘royal etiquette’. Buckingham Palace has denied there are any rules about touching the Queen. She may be the Queen, but she is just another person, when it comes down to it.
I also cannot see how smiling and approachability amounts to “yobbofication”. Being a yobbo is an entirely different thing altogether- a yobbo is a lout or hooligan, someone who is loud, offensive and ignorant. Being informal does not make you a yobbo, and at no point in my post did I make any reference to politicians being or becoming yobbos.
“There was a warmth, welcomeness, and willingness to dispense with formality radiating from the Obamas. In contrast, the Browns were retaining the stiff upper lip and formal, distant attitude that the Brits are so well-known for.”
That is YOUR interpretation. One could as well call it a stubborn sticking to good manners and a necessary distance to the public on the Browns’ side. What inherent higher value does “approachability” have, even if we grant, for argument’s sake, that all the approachability hype about the Obamas is NOT just that: hype. I have hardly ever seen a woman more hard as nails than Michelle Obama, however radiating her smile may be. I, as a European (German), can’t see anything enriching in an American (even if it’s the president) groping the Queen of England.
What we need is a renaissance of formality, not even more yobbofication.