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Humiliating apologies and speeches?
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Message 1.Ìý
Posted by Herewordless (U14549396) on Sunday, 8th May 2011
We remember Bill Clinton's deeply shameful situation a decade or so back, and how he squirmed and mumbled redfaced during his woefully embarrassing public 'apology' to America?
Ironically, much of the globe squirmed every time that utter dunce, President Dubya, even opened his mouth.
We Brits have had a few Politicians making laughable public excuses before assembled news reporters at the gates of their homes (wives and kids dutifully standing to attention, like a Victorian postcard!), for 'slipping and falling inside a gentleman' as Little Britain puts it?
There was that redoubtable US WWII General, old 'Blood and Guts' George Patton who, after slapping a hospitalised GI in Sicily in 1943, who was recovering from 'battle fatigue', was forced by his superiors, Ike and Bradley, to make a very public apology speech to the army.
Which other historic speeches were shameful or humiliating for the speaker? -
Message 2
Posted by raundsgirl (U2992430) on Sunday, 8th May 2011
How about G Brown's apology for callng an inoffensive lady a 'bigot'?
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Message 3
Posted by islanddawn (U7379884) on Sunday, 8th May 2011
I think that apology was more agonising for Mr Brown because he was actually correct in his comment, that lady was far from inoffensive. Oh and the fact that it was meant to be a private comment, to which he was entitled.
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Message 4
Posted by Vizzer aka U_numbers (U2011621) on Sunday, 8th May 2011
This is an example of someone making an embarrassing speech on someone else's behalf.
In John Aubrey's 'Brief Lives' he relates the story (apochryphal?) of Edward de Vere, Earl of Oxford bowing and farting in the presence of Queen Elizabeth I. Mortified he then went travelling for 7 years before daring to return to Court. On his return, however, the Queen welcomed him with the words "My Lord, I had forgot the fart". -
Message 5
Posted by Caro (U1691443) on Sunday, 8th May 2011
It isn't usually our politicians who have to apologise here, though recently we had one who had called people from his own party 'a gaggle of gays and self-serving unionists' which required an apology. We have a very feisty Maori MP who has to apologise every now and again, most recently for saying Osama Bin Laden's family were "in mourning for a man who fought for the rights, the lands, the freedoms for his people". Seemed relatively mild to me, coming from a man who is prepared to email another politician using words that start with m and have f in them and are not allowed here.
Our more idiotic radio presenters sometimes have to apologise. "Cheeky darkie" about the UN Secretary-General and querying if our governor-general was really a New Zealander (He was born in NZ to Fijian/Anglo-Indians.) didn't go down so well with everyone. Although it's amazing how many people can suppose people who say these sort of things. However the last statement did result in the presenter being sacked, apology or not.
Cheers, Caro. -
Message 6
Posted by Temperance (U14455940) on Thursday, 12th May 2011
What other historic speeches were shameful or humiliating for the speaker? Ìý
Thomas Cranmer was terribly humiliated when fear of death overcame him and, in a futile effort to save himself, he became the Archbishop of Recanterbury. During his imprisonment in Oxford in 1555/56, Cranmer made several recantations, but the most famous was the one in which he renounced every one of those precious beliefs upon which he and others had built the English Reformation:
"I, Thomas Cranmer, anathematise every heresy of Luther and Zwingli ... I confess and believe in one, holy, Catholic, visible Church ... I recognise as its Supreme Head upon earth the Bishop of Rome ... Pope and Vicar of Christ to whom all the faithful are bound subject.."
He went on to affirm the seven sacraments of the Catholic faith, including transubstantiation.
Apparently *utter* defeat and humiliation for the Protestant cause in England.
Yet not so! Just before his execution on March 21st 1556 Cranmer was allowed to address the congregation at University Church, Oxford: the Church authorites confidently expected he would abjectly reiterate his grovelling statement of submission. Big mistake - now he was definitely condemned to die, Cranmer had absolutely nothing to left to lose, and from somewhere this timid and scholarly man found the courage to recant all his recantations, famously declaring that he would thrust the shameful and offending hand (which had signed the recantation) into the fire first. He ended with this resounding denunciation of papal authority:
"And as for the Pope, I refuse him as Christ's enemy and anti-Christ with all his false doctrine."
All hell broke loose in University Church and Cranmer was dragged down from the pulpit and borne away to the stake. He did indeed thrust his "offending" hand into the flames first and, according to report, "stood straight as long as he could, ringed in fire, crying, 'Lord Jesus receive my spirit!' "
An absolutely magnificent end - one which wiped out all his shame and humiliation. -
Message 7
Posted by somewhatsilly (U14315357) on Thursday, 12th May 2011
Therefore, desiring to removed from the minds of Your Eminences and every faithful Christian this vehement suspicion, rightly conceived against me, with a sincere heart and unfeigned faith I abjure, curse, and detest the above-mentioned errors and heresies, and in general each and every other error, heresy, and sect contrary to the Holy Church; and I swear that in the future I will never again say or assert, orally or in writing, anything which might cause a similar suspicion about me; on the contrary, if I should come to know any heretic or anyone suspected of heresy, I will denounce him to this Holy Office, or to the Inquisitor or Ordinary of the place where I happen to be.Ìý
Galileo's forced renunciation must rate as one of the most humiliating, knowing as he did that his research was sound but that he did not have the courage to withstand the Inquisition. I find it hard to condemn him, I'm afraid there's very little I would not renounce when faced with the flames. -
Message 8
Posted by slippybee (U14590417) on Thursday, 12th May 2011
Does Hirohito's "Jewel Voice broadcast" announcing Japan's surrender at the end of WW2 count as a humiliating apology?
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Message 9
Posted by White Camry (U2321601) on Thursday, 12th May 2011
slippybee:
Does Hirohito's "Jewel Voice broadcast" announcing Japan's surrender at the end of WW2 count as a humiliating apology?Ìý
I don't see how. -
Message 10
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Thursday, 12th May 2011
But does perhaps rank as the understatement of the Millenium.:
the war situation has developed not necessarily to Japan's advantageÌý -
Message 11
Posted by Temperance (U14455940) on Thursday, 12th May 2011
May I offer another example from the 16th Century?
In June 1536 Mary Tudor finally gave way and succumbed to her father's demands that she admit that her parents' marriage had been incestuous and that she herself was illegitimate. She also declared that she acknowledged her father "to be Supreme Head on earth under Christ of the Church in England."
The document called "The Submission of the Lady Mary to the King, her Father" is available here: it makes extremely painful reading:
Mary was emotionally exhausted at the time: she had been cruelly bullied during a visit by the Duke of Norfolk, the Earl of Sussex and the Bishop of Chichester, and Cromwell had relentlessly subjected her (by letter) to more subtle but nevertheless intense and cunning psychological pressure. Even her great friend and supporter, Chapuys, the Spanish Ambassador, tried to persuade her to concede defeat, reassuring Mary that she could "do great good" if she were restored to favour, and that in any case a concession made under constraint (and Mary was with good reason at this time fearful for her life) could never "be binding in conscience".
It was all too much for a terrified and bereaved girl (her mother had died only six months before). Mary quite understandably gave in: she never, however, forgave herself for what she always considered to be her betrayal both of her mother and of her faith. -
Message 12
Posted by slippybee (U14590417) on Thursday, 12th May 2011
Hmmm..........you're right about my question.
The OP's original question was:
"Which other historic speeches were shameful or humiliating for the speaker?"
Again, I'd suggest this wasn't just shameful for the speaker but for the entire Nation he represented. -
Message 13
Posted by Mutatis_Mutandis (U8620894) on Thursday, 12th May 2011
But does perhaps rank as the understatement of the Millenium.:
the war situation has developed not necessarily to Japan's advantageÌý Ìý
Well, before Pearl Harbour, army minister Sugiyama had assured the emperor that in case of war, "a favorable conclusion is not necessarily beyond hope." -
Message 14
Posted by Mutatis_Mutandis (U8620894) on Thursday, 12th May 2011
There also was Reagan's Iran-Contragate speech. I can't find the text on-line. If I remember correctly, it ran along the lines of "My heart says we didn't sell weapons to Iran, but the facts indicate otherwise." Having to accept full responsibility for this fiasco perhaps didn't amount to an apology, but it was humiliating enough.
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