He's no Ghandi...oh wait
October 16, 2007 8:51 AM   Subscribe

The Nobel Foundation sheds some on the missing Nobel Peace Laureate--Mahatma Gandhi.
posted by reformedjerk (50 comments total) 5 users marked this as a favorite
 
Sheds some ... ?
posted by mr_crash_davis at 8:56 AM on October 16, 2007


Al Gore - Nobel Peace Prize
Mahatma Gandhi - Bubkiss

This makes no sense.
posted by caddis at 8:58 AM on October 16, 2007


Oh the passion!
posted by Pollomacho at 9:07 AM on October 16, 2007


Committee of starchy white Europeans never gives an award to a little brown man who embarrassed and overcame other starchy white Europeans? Go figure...
posted by Thorzdad at 9:08 AM on October 16, 2007 [1 favorite]


I didn't read the whole thing very thoroughly, but I have a guess: The content of his character?
posted by DU at 9:09 AM on October 16, 2007


If Gandhi was alive today he would be branded as being an ideologue, shrill, naive, and not worth listening to. (not that I believe those things myself)
posted by edgeways at 9:09 AM on October 16, 2007


Sheds some ... ?
hair, surely.
posted by peacay at 9:10 AM on October 16, 2007


If Gandhi was alive today he would be branded as being an ideologue, shrill, naive, and not worth listening to. (not that I believe those things myself)

Do you really believe that times have changed?
posted by Pope Guilty at 9:10 AM on October 16, 2007 [1 favorite]


Sheds some ... ?

Extra pounds of fat.
posted by DU at 9:10 AM on October 16, 2007


Maybe the committee didn't want him to sew his own formal wear.
posted by kuujjuarapik at 9:10 AM on October 16, 2007


If Gandhi was alive today he would be branded as being an ideologue, shrill, naive, and not worth listening to.

As he was back then.
posted by brevator at 9:13 AM on October 16, 2007


If Gandhi was alive today he would be branded as being an ideologue, shrill, naive, and not worth listening to. (not that I believe those things myself)

Yeah, because guys like him never get recognized these days.
posted by Pollomacho at 9:17 AM on October 16, 2007


Bad boy, Nobel! Bad, bad boy!
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 9:31 AM on October 16, 2007


The fact that Gandhi never got one but Henry Kissinger did is a great a black eye to the Nobel Peace Prize as it was to the Oscars that Martin Scorsese did not have an Academy Award until this past year and once lost to Kevin Costner.
posted by Astro Zombie at 9:32 AM on October 16, 2007


The article's an interesting examination of the situation from the Nobel folks' perspective. The reasoning presented (or speculated upon) is all rational enough, even if the ultimate omission seems unjust looking back. One of those situations where it'd be nice if there was more archival documentation to look at; Jahn's journal isn't enough, dammit.

Al Gore - Nobel Peace Prize
Mahatma Gandhi - Bubkiss


It's notable that the article conveys the apparent change in policy on the committee's part over time—that Ghandi didn't receive the prize sixty years ago says nothing as to whether he would have were he being considered by the committee of today, for example.
posted by cortex at 9:33 AM on October 16, 2007


Martin Scorsese did not have an Academy Award until this past year

And don't get me started about Kubrick. Bastards.
posted by cortex at 9:34 AM on October 16, 2007 [1 favorite]


If only Ghandi had PowerPoint
posted by null terminated at 9:38 AM on October 16, 2007 [3 favorites]


null terminated: If only Ghandi had PowerPoint Keynote.

Fixed that for you.
posted by cjorgensen at 9:43 AM on October 16, 2007


A small group of Scandinavian white men, born to wealth and privilege and charged with managing the fortunes of a rich endowment built on explosives sales, sit in high and mighty judgment over those people in the world - especially the colored ones - who are actively trying to change the world for the better.

What could possibly go wrong?
posted by ikkyu2 at 9:47 AM on October 16, 2007


There are always reasons to dislike people when that is your goal.
posted by srboisvert at 9:48 AM on October 16, 2007


ikkyu2: A small group of Scandinavian white men, born to wealth and privilege and charged with managing the fortunes of a rich endowment built on explosives sales, sit in high and mighty judgment over those people in the world - especially the colored ones - who are actively trying to change the world for the better.

What could possibly go wrong?


Those Norwegian bastards, promoting their "peace." They should just stick to blowing people up.
posted by Kattullus at 10:06 AM on October 16, 2007


Gandhi.
posted by dhartung at 10:12 AM on October 16, 2007 [1 favorite]


Who knows...maybe the world will get lucky one year, we spend the entire time blowing each other up, and the Committee will see that as an opportunity to give a shout out to the little Indian man.

I'm not holding my breath, of course. What's more likely is that sometime in the future someone uses the teachings of Gandhi as a springboard for their own peaceful efforts, and the Committee will give another joint award to this person and Gandhi.

Because it's actually really embarrassing to the award itself not to be given to one of the most peace-committed people of the 20th century.
posted by SeizeTheDay at 10:36 AM on October 16, 2007


What could possibly go wrong?

This is a pretty dumb comment. Aside from mistakes in judgement, I can't see how the Nobel Committee has made or could possibly make the world any worse.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 10:45 AM on October 16, 2007


Since all the Nobel Committee does is pass judgment, Blazecock - that is its sole function - I must agree with you. Once you eliminate everything the Nobel Committee does, there is no way left that they could do anything at all.

They have screwed the pooch a number of times. Check out Ochoa's "polynucleotide phosphorylase" Nobel for a particularly egregious example: they awarded the prize in Chemistry for characterization of an enzyme that assembled long strands of ribonucleic acids. Trouble was, in vivo the reaction conditions were different than the in vitro conditions in the paper, and the enzyme's real function was to break down ribonucleic acids, something that was already well-known and of considerably lesser interest.

That's not the only time the Nobel Committee has gotten it sadly wrong. The question people should be asking is not "Who is going to win the Nobel Prize?" but instead "Why exactly do we think the Nobel Committee's decisions are so important?"
posted by ikkyu2 at 10:52 AM on October 16, 2007


It wasn't simply explosives that Nobel invented, it was smokless powder which greatly magnified the killing power of guns.
posted by Pollomacho at 11:05 AM on October 16, 2007


I don't put a lot of stock in the Nobel Prize. Kissinger? de Klerk? Al Fucking Gore? Who fucking cares about the Nobel Prize.

Even if I agreed with all their choices for winners, it's a bullshit idea that single great individuals change the world by themselves. It denies the personal flaws of those individuals (and even Gandhi had plenty of those - he beat his wife and barred her from getting life-saving medical care, right?), and it ignores the power of mass movements. Without a mass movement, Gandhi would have been just some guy on a hunger strike.
posted by serazin at 11:09 AM on October 16, 2007


ikkyu2: They have screwed the pooch a number of times. Check out Ochoa's "polynucleotide phosphorylase" Nobel for a particularly egregious example

And what do mistakes in giving out the Medicine Nobel have to do with the Peace Prize? Same name, that's for sure, but it's two different organizations of people that give them out, the Norwegian parliament for the Peace Prize and the Medicine Nobel is given out by a small committee of people selected by the Karolinska Institute.

And yes, I do know that in retrospect not every Nobel Laureate seems deserving, but I think that on the whole, all the Nobels, literature, peace, chemistry, physics and medicine, have generally been awarded to people who've deserved it, Kissinger et al notwithstanding.

Of course, the galling thing is that there have only been a little bit more than a hundred awards given in each category, but probably at least two hundred people per award that have deserved to win and didn't. Which makes the occasional Kissinger so frustrating.

Even if I agreed with all their choices for winners, it's a bullshit idea that single great individuals change the world by themselves.

If only the Nobel Peace Prize was also given to groups of people, say non-profits or international orginizations. It's a shame the history of the prize isn't littered with these sort of things.
posted by Kattullus at 11:19 AM on October 16, 2007


The Peace Prize has been ridiculous in recent years. It seems to be the Nobel Prize for Making the World a Better Place in Some Unspecified Way, as the Economist put it.

The 2004 winner plants trees, the 2006 winner loans money to the poor, and the 2007 winner made a PowerPoint Keynote presentation lecturing the world about climate change, despite doing remarkably little about it himself while in office.
posted by Aloysius Bear at 11:34 AM on October 16, 2007 [1 favorite]


AHIMSA Y'ALL
posted by ahimsakid at 11:39 AM on October 16, 2007 [1 favorite]


That's not the only time the Nobel Committee has gotten it sadly wrong.

Did someone lose life or limb? Granted, a dumb mistake, but it's not like the species suffered irreparable harm because an enzyme was mischaracterized and someone won some cash.

And when the Nobel folks get it right, which is well more often than not, their selections draw general attention to important advancements and people. Just my opinion, but I think that's valuable.

I think, on the whole, the human species has been better off with Nobel's vast wealth being spent here, than on inheritance passed down to trust fund kids.

Nobel made blood money, but then most money since its invention is blood money, when you get down to it.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 11:40 AM on October 16, 2007


Which is to say, just because Gore won the same prize that Kissinger won, doesn't diminish from Gore's significant accomplishments. Nor does racist oversight regarding Ghandi diminish from the accomplishments of Gore or other legitimate prize recipients since its inception.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 11:44 AM on October 16, 2007 [2 favorites]


Who knows...maybe the world will get lucky one year, we spend the entire time blowing each other up, and the Committee will see that as an opportunity to give a shout out to the little Indian man.
Nobel prizes are never given to dead people.
posted by Catfry at 11:56 AM on October 16, 2007


Gandhi was such a menace! He was single-handedly responsible for the fastest buildup of an invading force in history, the advent of nuclear and conventional weapons, advances in nerve gas lethality and deployment, the carpet bombing of civilian centers, the strewing of land mines willy nilly across the earth, and the twelve-day work week.

Why, if it weren't for Hitler we'd all be speaking Gujarati!
posted by breezeway at 11:57 AM on October 16, 2007


Those Norwegian bastards, promoting their "peace." They should just stick to blowing people up.

What, like with Dynamite?
posted by loquacious at 12:34 PM on October 16, 2007


The Nobel Committee has its biases, of course. One of which, to echo serazin's point, is awarding the Peace Prize to individuals. Far more important are the grassroots movements that bring about social change. That is not to say that Ghandi didn't deserve a Nobel Peace Prize for his contributions. And why not award him one now, if the Nobel Committee regrets it so much? At least one Nobel Peace Prize has been awarded posthumously--UN General Secretary Dag Hammarskjöld was awarded a posthumous Nobel Peace Prize in 1961, although he had been nominated before his death. Ghandi was nominated five times during his lifetime. Better late than never...
posted by Dead Man at 1:24 PM on October 16, 2007


Well, let's just thank god they didn't overlook Yasir Arafat.
posted by koeselitz at 1:30 PM on October 16, 2007


At least one Nobel Peace Prize has been awarded posthumously--UN General Secretary Dag Hammarskjöld was awarded a posthumous Nobel Peace Prize in 1961, although he had been nominated before his death.

The Nobel Statutes have always required that a person be alive when nominated. In 1974 the Statutes were further revised to require that the person be alive when the Prize was announced.
posted by DevilsAdvocate at 2:05 PM on October 16, 2007


The Nobel Statutes have always required that a person be alive when nominated.

And from the link, I read it as "alive when the decision was made", even, though I'm not clear if that was explicit (and just further clarified/narrowed in 1974) or merely held as established tradition.
posted by cortex at 2:22 PM on October 16, 2007


The Nobel Committee has its biases, of course. One of which, to echo serazin's point, is awarding the Peace Prize to individuals.

You might want to read Kattullus' point directly after.
posted by dreamsign at 2:24 PM on October 16, 2007


serazin said:

and even Gandhi had plenty of those - he beat his wife and barred her from getting life-saving medical care, right?

Where'd you get this? You want to point to a reputable biography (or other publication) that asserts this?

I don't believe Gandhi was perfect, but that's a powerful claim you're making, and cursory googling doesn't turn up any supporting evidence that seems remotely authoritative or reliable. Googling "gandhi wife beating" turns up an ask mefi post on top. Maybe it's in this book?

I haven't really done my homework, but it seems like the onus is on you to back up a claim like that. Give us a link, will ya?
posted by tarheelcoxn at 3:36 PM on October 16, 2007


I'm mildly amused that anyone finds the Peace Prize noteworthy, newsworthy, or otherwise of interest.

And I am skeptical of people who are claiming racism and throwing around phrases like "little brown man" and such.
posted by davidmsc at 4:18 PM on October 16, 2007


And I am skeptical of people who are claiming racism and throwing around phrases like "little brown man" and such.

Heh. That's fair enough. Luckily, I too am a little brown man. Unfortunately, that doesn't really translate well in the online world. Kills at parties, though.
posted by SeizeTheDay at 5:17 PM on October 16, 2007


Oh, and I'm not sure where in my comment I indicated that the Peace Prize Committee was racist. Project much? Or protest too much?
posted by SeizeTheDay at 5:18 PM on October 16, 2007


Huh, and rereading my comment, I never even said brown.

Dude, you suck.
posted by SeizeTheDay at 5:19 PM on October 16, 2007


Um...hey, SeizeTheDay -- did you actually READ the comments in this thread, or just skim for references to your name and assume that any criticism of anything in this thread somehow revolved around you?

I never said that YOU used the phrase "little brown man" or claimed that your comment was racist. I was generalizing about several comments, such as this one and this one.

So, back to you, SeizeTheDay: protest much? Or project much? Dude, YOU suck.
posted by davidmsc at 6:44 PM on October 16, 2007


Blame John Briley, Gandhi screenwriter, for the words he found in Edward R. Murrow's mouth:

Mahatma Gandhi was not a commander of great armies nor ruler of vast lands, he could boast no scientific achievements, no artistic gift... Yet men, governments and dignitaries from all over the world have joined hands today to pay homage to this little brown man in the loincloth who led his country to freedom...

As I recall, "little brown man in the loincloth" was more than just a screenwriter's conceit, but a cursory search yields no contemporary evidence. At any rate, ignore others' obvious tips of the pen at your own rhetorical risk.
posted by breezeway at 7:30 PM on October 16, 2007


I don't get your objection to awarding a peace prize for tree-planting or anti-poverty work, Aloysius Bear.
Seems a much more grown-up approach to recognise those who address some of the underlying causes of conflict rather than to give gongs to the people sat round a table when a ceasefire got signed.
posted by Abiezer at 7:33 PM on October 16, 2007


That was in a time when eugenism was so "in" in all of Europe.
posted by zouhair at 8:16 PM on October 16, 2007


1) In general, the committee awards the prize to a single individual. Sometimes to two people. Occasionally to an organization. I object to their usual policy which reinforces the Great Man theory of history. If they are genuinely concerned with 'peace' (whatever that means!) I would argue that they should favor organizations, if for no other reason than that the money would probably be better utilized by an organization than an individual.

2) Gandhi: Apparently, he and his wife Kasturbi were married when they were 13. I can imagine that could potentially lead to a level of resentment on both of their parts - it certainly seems to have in his case. He discusses, or at least alludes to the way he controlled her when they were teens. This would have been pretty typical within the social context he was a part of of course. I found more about his controlling her, specifically in the realm of her medical care in this book. here's a mention of the circumstances around his wife's death,

Another Nobel winner, V.S Naipaul, accused Gandhi of helming a movement that centered on himself rather than on the issues. I can't be bothered to try to dig up the original essay - and I haven't read it, so I won't pretend I know his whole analysis.

My point isn't to run-down Gandhi. Like everyone, he was full of contradictions, but that doesn't particularly phase me. But what does phase me is treating him like a saint. He dedicated his life to service and social change. He deserves the world's respect for his commitment, discipline, and leadership. But he's just one person who was part of a bigger movement. And it would be wrong to see him as perfect.
posted by serazin at 10:48 PM on October 16, 2007


« Older Biplanes and triplanes and Zeppelins-- Oh My!   |   Selling out Newer »


This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments