This peace prize was hard to accept, but I’m willing to be corrupted

2 hours ago 1

Opinion

December 19, 2025 — 5.57pm

I guess I’m guilty of taking the world as I see it, accepting too easily that how things are is how they will be, not being brave enough, or maverick enough, to look beyond existing norms into the world of the possible ... the Nirvanas, Utopias, Elysiums, Shangri-Las and neato Twilight Zones that the seers see. I’m just not the sort of freethinker who would have said to himself: “The President of the United States is inconsolable because the Nobel Committee won’t give him his peace prize. But who made them the boss of peace prizes? Hell, why don’t I chip in and give him one myself?”

Bravo, Gianni Infantino, innovator, philanthropist ... gifted cynic.

It’s a brilliant stroke of paradigm-busting abstraction. And having just watched the president of one of the most historically corrupt organisations to ever regularly exchange bribes with jabbering potentates give a hastily invented peace prize to Trump, it occurred to me that if a scourge like that could do it, then why not me?

I suddenly saw there was no power on this unholy planet preventing me from promoting myself to the role of prize-giver. Why have I never thought to elect myself as a bestower of major global awards before now? Nobels with no bells and whistles ... it’s a no-brainer.

When the toadying to Trump becomes as barefaced as this, there’s an expectation among moral people that his MAGA deplorables will be forced by some flickering ember of remembered conscience, some fossilised vestige of honesty deep in the gut, to admit they were wrong, and that corruption is once more gelatinously slumped on its throne. Sadly, barefaced bribery essentially works the other way – its openness and shamelessness indicate it is, and should be, legitimate.

When people aren’t ashamed, you assume they have no reason to be. People see bribery working and understand the deal – tithes to kings, frankincense and myrrh to the baby in the barn, money in the plate on Sunday, fanciful trophies for egomaniacs – flattery and bribery have always been traditional stepladders for aspirants. Get on board the Largesse Express or get left behind, sucker.

Open bribery can’t be morally wrong when everyone’s doing it, surely. You’d be a fool not to grease the despotic palm and snog the absolutist freckle if that’s where the gold is. When the backhander becomes accepted business practice, it must be factored into expenditure as an investment. And once the sling is a cultural norm, criticism of it is offensive, unpatriotic and naive.

But we’re not quite there yet. From his long career of milking weasels, Signor Infantino of FIFA knew Trump would be the only person of the nine billion on the planet unable to see their peace prize for what it is – a lollipop force-fed to a simpleton prince. A gift from the giver to himself. Using a grotesque bauble as currency, Infantino bought himself an orange house elf for Christmas.

It goes unremarked in MAGA circles that Trump’s peace prize is merely a participant’s award – the very thing they rage against. Some cynic suggested he should henceforth be known as Participant of the United States.

The magic of prizes is that only the prizewinner never understands the true relevance of the thing they’ve just been given. It’s like being headshot by a sniper. At the 77th Annual Golden Globes, Ricky Gervais told the stars no one else cared about their awards as much as they did: “So if you win, come up, accept your little award, thank your agent and your god and f--- off, OK?”

US President Donald Trump shakes hands with South Korean President Lee Jae Myung as he receives a gift of a gold crown and an award of the Grand Order of Mugunghwa in October.

Common sense, history and jealousy tell us that most political leaders and movie stars are hogtied by narcissism and sociopathy. And as such they are horribly vulnerable to awards, prizes, gongs, statuettes, medals. Their nature makes them tethered lions, bred to be shot by accolade. Every honour seen as risible when awarded to a competitor becomes sacred and meaningful when they get it.

So if there is anyone out there reading this able to manufacture colossal troppo-rococo trophies for next to nix, contact me through this masthead. I’ll be awarding quite a few globally significant gongs in 2026 and I’ll need bling that will stand out in a golden ballroom.

What do you suppose Trump will think when I award him The 2026 Universal Award for Unmatched Excellence in the Field of Outstanding Achievement? He’ll swallow it whole with a smile, and I’ll be on my way. Did any freshly gonged grandee ever pause to ponder the dark arts of Alfred Nobel?

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