Absurd Intellectual

What? You haven’t heard of Absurd Intellectual’s 2010 Politician of the Year, Jon Gnarr? What’s the matter with you? Don’t you follow international politics?

Jon Gnarr is the mayor of Reykjavik, Iceland, elected to that position in June of this year. What qualifies him as this year’s politician of the year is not the fact that he has been a punk rocker, writer, actor, comedian and a creative at an advertising agency. The best part about Mr. Gnarr is that he ran for mayor as a prank. And won.

In Reykjavik, municipal politics has political parties. Gnarr founded the Best Party to lampoon the political process. His political campaign included: Free towels in all swimming pools, getting a polar bear for the Reykjavík Zoo, “all kinds of things for weaklings”, a drug-free parliament by 2020, and (my new favorite buzz-word combination) Sustainable Transparency. On election day, the Best Party won 6 of the 15 available seats and took almost 35% of the vote.

As mayor, he continues with the central premise of his party: making fun of politics. In one of his first mayoral addresses to the city, he spoke like a true politician (ie. complete nonsense):

The odds of you being in Reykjavik are not great. The greatest part of mankind is elsewhere. It is scientifically proven. When I was little, I would often ask myself why I had been born in Reykjavik. Is it a coincidence where one is born? Is it subject to some universal law? Did I exist in any form before I was born? Did I have anything to do with where I was born? Why did Eva Braun and Adolf Hitler not bear any children? Did they not try to? Can it be that no child wanted them as parents? I don’t know, but I do not believe in coincidence. I do not believe that God plays dice, especially not when human lives are concerned. These thoughts inevitably lead one to consider Schrodinger’s cat. He is probably one of the most famous cats in the world (maybe after Ninja Cat). Still no one knows what it was called? What was Schrodinger’s cat called? Abracadabra? I don’t remember. Let’s call it Phoenix. That is a common name for cats. Phoenix was of the nature that it both existed and not. Therefore, it always existed, and even if Schrodinger killed his cat in a rather tasteless manner, it is still alive at Schrodinger’s house, while Schrodinger himself has been dead for a long time.

Does this mean that I always existed, or that I never existed and do therefore not exist now? That can’t be! It would mean that all our existence was unreal and only existed in our own imagination. If I do not exist, then neither do you. I have a hard time believing that. The facts speak for themselves. If I am not real, then how could I fly to Finland, send myself a post card with a picture of Tarja Halonen, the President of Finland, fly back home and welcome the mailman that brought me the card? I don’t know. I am one of many Icelanders that believe in elves and trolls. I mainly believe in Moomin elves. It is more of a certainty than a belief. I have seen them and touched them. I know they exist. I have been to Moominworld in Naantali, Finland. I have evidence; photographs, video recordings and witnesses. I had a good talk with Moomin Papa. He told me that life in Moominvalley was much better after Finland joined the EU. He encouraged us Icelanders to join the EU. He also said that the Moomins had always existed, long before Tove Jansson “invented” them. The Moomins are eternal, at least in books.

I hope these thoughts shed some light on the history of Reykjavik and its culture. I hope you enjoy your time in Reykjavik, that you go swimming a lot and tell all your friends how fun Reykjavik is, and how everyone is always happy there and that you will never forget your hotel, and the eternally young cat Phoenix.

Iceland is in a bad way, financially. It seems to me that any city in a country which found itself for sale on Ebay not so long ago that can elect a comedian for mayor is a city worth visiting.

And perhaps inspiration for the next generation of politicians.