Barack Obama took to the stage at an event in Singapore on Monday to ponder one the world’s most revolutionary questions: wouldn’t the world be better if it were run by women?
He said: “Now, women, I just want you to know: you are not perfect, but what I can say pretty indisputably is that you’re better than us [men].”
Some have questioned Obama’s motives: is he just taking a shot at Bernie Sanders? Others called him condescending, equating his statement to the men who praise their stay-at-home wives for doing “the most important job in the world”.
Would it be uncouth to say that Obama has become … a centrist dad? Who lectures people with extremely mundane, unsolicited opinions?
Here are some past examples:
1. When he told Black Lives Matter to stop yelling
In 2016, Obama met young people in Europe and was asked whether his administration had gone far enough in tackling racial profiling. Instead of answering the question, Obama turned his attention towards the Black Lives Matter movement.
“Once you’ve highlighted an issue and brought it to people’s attention … then you can’t just keep on yelling at them,” Obama said.
And so, the president who ran on a campaign promising people “Yes, we can” was using his platform to criticize a campaign group working to highlight how routinely American police shoot and kill unarmed black men.
2. When he complained about woke culture
When Obama took the stage to talk down to young people in October, it was almost too easy to agree with him. The world is messy, he said, so we should be more careful about our tendency to “cancel” people online – especially if our judgment is replacing real action.
Which all sounds fair enough. But then came his central message: that change is incremental. “We can’t completely remake society in a minute. This idea of purity and you’re never compromised and you’re always politically woke … you should get over that quickly,” he said.
There is a term for older people who benefitted from the boom and are now criticising young people for wanting change too quickly, and I think it’s: OK, boomer.
3. When he said America was not ready for real change
In November, Obama – who now has a net worth of $70m – stood up in front of a room of similarly wealthy people to reassure them that the system doesn’t need to be radically changed.
“Even as we push the envelope and we are bold in our vision, we also have to be rooted in reality,” Obama said at the annual Democracy Alliance meeting, attended by wealthy liberal donors. “The average American doesn’t think we have to completely tear down the system and remake it.”
Perhaps Americans wanting radical change should re-think their approach. Get ready to lean in to good health insurance, everybody!
4. When he bragged about helping oil companies
At a Rice University gala in 2018, Obama took credit for the oil and gas boom in America. “It went up every year I was president. Suddenly America’s the biggest oil producer and the biggest gas. That was me, people, say thank you,” he said.
Oil production grew 88% under Obama’s two terms. The US is also one of the biggest consumers of fossil fuels, and the planet is literally burning – so this is not exactly something to be proud of, but credit where credit is due, I guess.
5. When he said he’d stand up to stop Sanders
Obama has said he would support any Democratic nominee for president in 2020. But judging by a Politico report from November, he doesn’t include Bernie Sanders in that list. The piece quoted close sources to him who said that Obama has refrained from speaking out against Bernie so far because Sanders doesn’t look like a credible threat.
But privately, Politico reported, Obama has vowed to “speak up to stop him” if it looks like Sanders has a proper shot at winning the nomination.