TRASHING CHRISTMAS NOT ENOUGH; NYTIMES NOW TRASHES "ODE TO JOY" - IN TIME FOR CHRISTMAS

NYTIMES: Ode to Joy,’ Followed by Chaos and Despair

By SLAVOJ ZIZEK

London

LAST week, European Union leaders put an end to a decade of diplomatic wrangling and signed the Treaty of Lisbon, which outlined a complete overhaul of the organization, including the creation of a permanent post of European Union president to represent Europe on the world stage. During the ceremony at Lisbon’s grandiose Jerónimos Monastery, a choir performed Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy” in the background. While the fourth movement of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, first performed in 1824, may seem an innocuous choice for the official anthem of the European Union (it was declared such in 1972), it actually tells much more than one would expect about Europe’s predicament today.

The “Ode to Joy” is more than just a universally popular piece of classical music that has become something of a cliché during the holiday season (especially, oddly, in Japan, where it has achieved cult status). It has also been, for more than a century, what literary theorists call an “empty signifier” — a symbol that can stand for anything.

In early 20th-century France, the Nobel laureate Romain Rolland declared it to be the great humanist ode to the brotherhood of all people, and it came to be called “the Marseillaise of humanity.” In 1938, it was performed as the high point of the Reichsmusiktage, the Nazi music festival, and was later used to celebrate Hitler’s birthday. In China during the Cultural Revolution, in an atmosphere of total rejection of European classics, it was redeemed by some as a piece of progressive class struggle.

In the 1950s and ’60s, when the West German and East German Olympic squads were forced to compete as a single team, gold medals were handed out to the strains of the “Ode to Joy” in lieu of a national anthem. It served as the anthem, too, for the Rhodesian white supremacist regime of Ian Smith. One can imagine a fictional performance at which all sworn enemies — Hitler and Stalin, Saddam Hussein and George W. Bush — for a moment forget their adversities and participate in the same magic moment of ecstatic musical brotherhood.

• THIS IS NONSENSE.
• THE ODE TO JOY IS NOT AN EMPTY SIGNIFIER.
  
• AND THE ODE IS NOT MERELY AN ODE TO BROTHERHOOD OF MEN, BUT TO THE UNDERLYING FACT THAT WE ARE ALL BROTHERS BECAUSE WE ARE ALL CHILDREN OF GOD; IT IS A DEEPLY RELIGIOUS ODE.
• AND NEITHER STALIN, HITLER, OR SADDAM WERE BELIEVERS.

EXCERPTS FROM THE ODE TO JOY:

Be embraced, you millions!
This kiss for the entire world!
Brothers, above the starry canopy
Must a loving Father reside.

... Do you fall before him, you millions?
Do you sense the Creator, world?
Seek him above the starry canopy,
Above the stars he must live.

... Endure courageously, you millions!
Endure for the better world!
Over the starry canopy
A good God will reward you!

... Close the holy circle tighter,
Swear by this golden vine:
Remain true to the vows,
Swear by the judge above the stars!

ZIZEK IS NOT A BELIEVER, AND SO "CONVENIENTLY" LEAVES THE FACT THAT THE ODE IS A RELIGIOUS WORK OF ART OUT OF HIS ATTACK PIECE POSING AS INSIGHT.

• ZIZEK'S CRITICSM OF BEETHOVEN'S MASTERPIECE - PERHAPS THE GREATEST MUSIC EVER WRITTEN - APPEARS TO BE AN ATTACK ON EUROPE FOR LEAVING TURKEY OUT OF THE EU.

• BUT DOES TURKEY REALLY BELONG IN THE EU - AFTER ALL, IT IS NOT EVEN IN EUROPE.

• WHEN ASKED WHY HE FELT TURKEY DID NOT BELONG ON THE EU, SARKOZY EXPLAINED: "I CAN READ A MAP!"

• TURKEY ONLY BELONGS IN EUROPE TO THOSE - LIKE ZIZEK - WHO WANT TO SEE EUROPE DESTROYED.

JUST WHO IS ZIZEK? A LEFTIST CREEP - ONE OF THE WORST AND LOWEST "PHILOSPHERS" OF POSTMODERN CRAP SO IDIOTIC ONLY INTELLECTUALS LIKE HIM BELIEVE IT. FACTS:

Žižek is well known for his use of the works of 20th century French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan in a new reading of popular culture. He writes on countless topics including the Iraq War, fundamentalism, capitalism, tolerance, political correctness, globalization, subjectivity, human rights, Lenin, myth, cyberspace, postmodernism, multiculturalism, post-marxism, David Lynch, and Alfred Hitchcock. In an interview with the Spanish newspaper El País he jokingly described himself as an "orthodox Lacanian Stalinist".[1]

Recently, Žižek wrote text to accompany Bruce Weber photos in a catalogue for Abercrombie & Fitch. Questioned as to the seemliness of a major intellectual writing ad copy, Žižek told the Boston Globe: "If I were asked to choose between doing things like this to earn money and becoming fully employed as an American academic, kissing ass to get a tenured post, I would with pleasure choose writing for such journals!"[4]

He is widely regarded as a fiery and colorful lecturer who does not shy away from controversial remarks. His three part documentary The Pervert's Guide to Cinema was broadcast on British television by the More4 channel in July 2006 and is now available, worldwide, on DVD [3]. Zizek has been publishing on a regular basis in journals such as Lacanian Ink and In These Times in the United States, and in New Left Review and The London Review of Books in the United Kingdom.

• A POSTMODERNIST OF THE WORST KIND.

• A FOE OF GOD.

• A FOE OF BEETHOVEN.

PERFECT FOR THE NYTIMES. ESPECIALLY ON CHRISTMAS EVE.

HERE'S A VIDEO LEONARD BERNSTEIN TALKING ABOUT THE ODE TO JOY AND PERFORMING IT IN VIENNA. WTWT!

(LONG-TIME FRIENDS OF THE ASTUTE BLOGGERS MAY REMEMBER THIS IS THE THIRD TIME I HAVE POSTED IT. YOU CAN'T GET TOO MUCH OF A GRRRRREAT THINGS!)

ZIZEK IS PASSE - A VESTIGE OF THE POSTMODERN LEFT WHO BELONGS ON THE TRASH HEAP WITH LACAN AND MARX AND STALIN AND DERRIDA AND - AND THE NYTIMES.

BEETHOVEN IS ETERNAL.

HERE ARE PARTS 2 AND 3...