Superannuated Super Friends

I'm sorry, but if I saw this bunch coming my way, I'd run.

Why?

Maybe I asked that wrong. Why would some of the most respected humanitarians in the world cause you to run in the other direction. Even slowly?

I heard they hired a Stones roadie to cut up their meat.

Mandela (who's right up there with the Almighty in world opinion), IMHO you have to at least give a good reason ...

Yeah, too bad the Almighty is not held in such high esteem by "world opinion", isn't it?

Whenever I hear the word "humanitarian", I reach for my revolver.

If you have issues with some members of this group, why not criticize them as individuals for what they've done or said, rather than mocking them because they're old? Does the idea of respect for elders seem so ludicrous in the context of conservative tradition? That's kind of a peculiar conservatism, there.

You do know the story of the old grandpa and the little wooden trough, don't you? I think it's a Grimm brothers tale, though there's no element of the fantastic in it. As well as I recall at the moment, it goes like this:

Grandpa is getting older, and his son and daughter-in-law and their little boy move in with the old man to help run the place and look after him. As he gets older and less able, they start to feel that the house rightfully belongs to them, not him, and they take over and start to boss him around more and pay him less respect. In his infirmity, he finds it hard to eat tidily. The wife can't stand his drooling and dropping food. "It's disgusting," she says. "It's not a fit sight for the boy. We can't have him at the table with us, disrupting our family meal. Let him eat in the chimney corner by himself. It's good enough for him."

So they remove him from the table where they continue to enjoy their meals in what was once his house. But pretty soon even that doesn't seem good enough. His presence is a continuing reproach and annoyance to them. They move him out to the shed. "Dad's better off there anyway," the son says. "He'll be more comfortable on his own, away from normal people." The wife takes his plate out to him and he eats by himself. But pretty soon she comes to resent his using and dirtying up her good china. "I'm afraid he'll drop one of my good plates and break it," she complains. "Then I wouldn't have a complete set any more." "You're right, my dear," the son agrees. "Those were expensive plates. And Pops doesn't know the difference anyway. Nice china means nothing to him now."

So the son, a clever artisan, sets to work to make a wooden trough for the old man to eat out of. As he's finishing up, he notices his young son whittling earnestly at a little scrap of wood. "What are you doing there, my darling sonny boy?" he asks fondly. "Oh, look, Daddy dear," replies the little boy. "I'm making a little wooden trough for you and Mommy to eat out of when you get old like Grandpa!"

The man feels a cold chill at his heart. He goes out to the shed and brings Grandpa back in the house. The old man is served his meals in honor at the head of the table, and nothing further is said of his little spills. "After all, he is our father," says the man. "We owe this house and all we have to him."

Just sayin'.

I agree with Rod on this. I don't think he was mocking these men as elders, he was pointing out the pretense that these men call themselves "Elders" and are going to solve the world's problems. That is arrogance, pure and simple, which is not a Christian virtue.
Take a look at their website - it's embarrasingly self-exaltating.
I'm happy to learn from elders on a personal level, who have much wisdom and maturity to impart, which they earned from tough experiences.
One lesson I have often heard from older people: Don't think too highly of yourself. You don't know as much as you think you do. Humility is the beginning of wisdom. But these men, the Elders, I don't think I have too much to learn from. They are too far above me, walking on the clouds.

Don't have a problem with Rod's comments. An old fool is far more contemptible than a young one. Especially a meddling old fool who has the money to cause massive harm.

I think Rod is mocking their self-importance, not their age. Just 'cause someone's part of the "greatest generation" (and I'll never forgive Tom Brokaw for that smarmy, pretentious book) doesn't mean they're wiser than thou.

Better a group of old people with world-changing life experiences and several Nobel prizes amongst them calling themselves 'Elders' than a couple of early 20 year old kids at my front door on a Saturday morning wanting to tell me about Mormonism calling themselves 'Elders', I always say....

Dang Mormons.

Tell us: how many societies have you helped move from oppression to equality like Mandela and Tutu? How many nations have you run? How long were you the Secretary General of the UN? How many Nobel Peace Prizes has "Crunchy Cons" won?

Three. One. Six years. None -- it won the Nobel prize for Literature this spring. Didn't you get my invitation to the prize lecture? I totally cribbed it from Faulkner.