Perhaps it was just poor framing when Cardinal Joachim Meisner said:
“Wherever culture is separated from the worship of God, the cult atrophies in ritualism and culture becomes degenerate,” he said.
The word “degenerate” is hardly ever used in Germany today because of its known association with the Third Reich.
Well, yes, I can imagine that there is some sensitivity to the use of the word … but perhaps they should also consider the substance of his remarks. He has basically just said atheists are incapable of producing art: no music, no beauty, no poetry, none of the great works of the human mind.
He has made the usual disclaimer that his words were taken out of context — he didn’t mean to associate his position with a term used by Nazis. He has not, however, repudiated the sense of his words — the dehumanization of those who do not believe in his superstition.
As an atheist artist, I’m going to have to go with a shameless plug:
http://jennifurret.deviantart.com
Can’t create beauty my ass.
Isn’t that silly? As if your own blog doesn’t disprove his point, PZ honey. There is plenty of degenerate art in religious art too. It didn’t take me three Google searches to find this one, for instance. xoxo
Yeah, look at all the art coming out of the Jesus-loving American South.
It’s interesting that you note how “degenerate” has fallen out of use in Germany. One of my colleagues, when doing research there, could not get people to identify “racially” for exactly the same reason. The concept of “race” was absolutely polluted and discredited by the Holocaust.
What is Jesus doing with a big radish in his chest?
Jesus has degenerated so much, He no longer has his stigmata.
Whatever they have to do to instill fear in others.
And now Conservapedia is trying to exonerate Joseph McCarthy (check their main page: “Learn what Wikipedia does not tell you about the vast Communist conspiracy that almost undermined the United States government!”)
“Yeah, look at all the art coming out of the Jesus-loving American South.”
Umm… right. So long as you ignore several musical genres that were born here (rock & roll, jazz, country, bluegrass, soul, gospel) and some of the finest American writers (William Faulkner, Tennessee Williams, Truman Capote, Harper Lee, etc.), the South is a cultural wasteland. We may be screwed up in various ways down here, but lack of culture isn’t one of them.
some of the finest American writers (William Faulkner, Tennessee Williams, Truman Capote, Harper Lee, etc.)
Pfffft… None of those people were on American Idol or Big Brother, so they aren’t part of culture no matter how many fancy-shmancy words they put on paper… =p
That’s nothing.
Once I heard someone claim that if you do not believe in God, you cannot love your mother, because you despise your creator.
Of course, the following argument was kind of intense.
Hmm, I read Meisner’s comment the other way around: Whenever religion is cut off from culture, it (religion, in my reading) devolves into ritualism. That certainly rings true to me.
Jazz and rock and roll are usually rather blasphemously secular, but yeah, they have their roots in blues and gospel, so sure, religion played a role.
I wouldn’t think of denying that the religious (or the people of the South!) are capable of great art — but I wouldn’t ascribe that facility to a fictitious god, but to human talent, and I definitely would not claim that atheists are destitute of that human ability.
#1 you are good! it was well worth going over there to take a look, but I was too dumb to figure out how to leave comment on your site.
MJ,
Neil Young and all of us liked “Sweet Home Alabama”, so don’t worry. :)
Another talentless atheistic artist/designer here. Whatever… file this one along side the “only insane or manic-depressive artists make work of any worth” and “only dead artists make money” myths.
I could not believe my own ears when I saw his speech on TV, one should think people finally learned not to use certain buzzwords.
I personally believe degenerate is the worst possible translation anyway, words like perverted may fit more…considering entarted is also used to describe tissues like tumors
btw, in case some were wondering, here is a nice, short diddy relating to why PZ titled the thread in the way he did:
http://www.tate.org.uk/collections/glossary/definition.jsp?entryId=84
I’m sure it wasn’t obvious to some.
That’s just crazy talk. Along with Jennifurret, I am an atheist/Bright artist. And there are a lot more on deviantART than just the two of us; just search under “Darwin” or “Brights” and groups come up, as well as tons of the people fond of drawing dinosaurs, (usually without humans and arks).
I’m not familiar with deviantART’s origins, but it wouldn’t surprise me if the whole name came from claiming-the-insult. Degenerate, deviant art indeed.
As for poetry…anyone remember Percy Shelley? Sheesh.
Oh yeah, here’s my shameless plug. The deviantART gallery is to the immediate right on my blog sidebar, or you can tap the painting or drawing labels.
http://glendonmellow.blogspot.com
Conservatives have been trying to exonerate McCarthy for some time now, it’s nothing new. The execrable Ann Coulter spent quite some time on it, but of course, she’s not representative of conservatism, right? She;s just a headliner at all their big events, a guest appearance with Republican Presidential candidates here and there, and so on…
The attempts to exonerate McCarthy are a prime example of conservative ‘logic’. There were Communists in the US governments -Skip a rather major point- therefore McCarthy was a Hero. The missing point that those of in real world land readily acknowledge: McCarthy missed damn near all the real Communists… Instead he ruined innocent people’s lives on the word of a few reactionary actors out to get some of their colleagues. Yep, prime Hero material right there…
Dan Barker wrote an article called “It Ain’t Necessarily So: Music’s Debt To Nonbelievers”. It’s in the book Everything You Know About God Is Wrong. Here’s some of the names he lists.
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Ludwig Van Beethoven
Johannes Brahms
Aaron Copland
Scott Joplin
Irving Berlin
George Gershwin
Henry Mancini
those are just the names that i recognized. There were many more.
MAJeff: I thought science had disproved “race” genetically. Personally I never answer questions about race because they’re always multiple choice and never have “American” as an option.
Who says you have to be an atheist to create degenerate art?
Of course, I’m an atheist, as you can tell from looking at the degenerate art you’ll find by clicking on my name:
Well, leaving aside the understandable sensitivity about the word in Germany, it’s just such a stupid thing to say. Hardly surprising, though. It’s just the usual Don Imus (now I know who that is) theism that we’ve come to expect from the Vatican leadership.
How do you say fucktard in German?
The sense I get of this statement is that every culture exists for one reason, and no other reason: forever and always, to toady up to this one god.
He believes every art, every science, every act that humans might take, unless it’s meant as praise to Cardinal Meisner’s deity (and no other), is worse than meaningless.
At least as far as this statement reveals him, his religion has made him empty, shallow, unimaginative, and probably even nihilistic.
How do you say fucktard in German?
Schwarzenegger?
no, wait, that would be close, but more correctly Austrian.
sorry.
:p
PZ, a radish? That’s silly–it’s obviously a turnip. I want to know why that guy has blue eyes.
Oh yeah? Check out what Conservapedia doesn’t tell you about its relation to Wikipedia in that article:
Q.E. D’oh.
Oh yeah? Check out what Conservapedia doesn’t tell you about its relation to Wikipedia in that article:
Q.E. D’oh.
The missing link.
The missing link.
I prefer entartete Kirschen myself :^)
Mit ihm ist nicht gut kirschen essen… (A colloquial saying describing a disagreeable person.)
Heading from the conservapedia website:
“A Conservative Encyclopedia You Can Trust.”
What the hell is a conservative encyclopedia? Does it discuss things such as Muslim physics and Christian astronomy? What about revisionist history? Alternative realities? Unmitigated idiocy?
Dickkopfig pangut.
It’s true that a number of great artists were religious and that religion inspiried a lot of great art, but it is equally true that a number of great (and not so great) artists partook in various illegal (and legal) drugs – the list of artists that have died from drug overdoses or long-time drug use is as long and as depressing as the list of artists that have found faith or joined strange cults.
Mental illnesses (other than religion..) also seem to feature heavily when reading about the life of many of the artists that have brought us so much great art.
Drugs, religion and mental illnesses are bad, m’kay – no amount of great art will change that.
Regarding PZ’s original comment: a lot of commentators in Germany have, in fact, lambasted not only the use of the term “entartet”, but also the substance of Meisner’s speech. For example, it has been said that, while Meisner has the right to hold such narrow, bigoted, mediaeval fundamentalist views on art in private, he should keep them to himself in public and issue a retraction. Except for a few Church officials (mostly from Meisner’s own archbishopric), reactions to both diction and substance of his speech have been universally damning, even from conservative Christian Democratic Party politicians. Most of the criticism isn’t phrased explicitly in terms of “discrimination against atheists”, though, but rather in terms of Meisner being a narrow-minded, bigoted mediaeval fundamentalist dimwit who doesn’t know the first thing about art and culture. However, this is nothing to be worried about since Meisner – precisely because of this sort of public utterings – has become a kind of maverick recently (and an embarrassment for most of the German Catholics I know).
Pope Stig: “Mental illnesses (other than religion..) also seem to feature heavily when reading about the life of many of the artists that have brought us so much great art.”
Sure, and they’re just the ones to expand the envelope of creativity and experience. One doesn’t see much ‘great art’ from the sensibly mundane.
Its not as if strange associations brought about by wild and wooly mental excursions can’t say something interesting or true. It can help to be at least little nuts in order to be a good artist.
A little insanity works wonders. It can be a good thing too. If nothing else, their works can and do serve an important if not vital function for societies, as a reference – a sanity check if you will, for us collectively.
Unfortunately,”degenerate” is not a proper translation of “entartet“.
In the notorious exhibition “Entartete Kunst” in Munich 1937 pictures drawn by mentally ill patients was placed beside work of artists to devalue the work and to discredit the artists. Thus, in German the connotation of “entartet” is much worse than that of degenerate“.
A description of the exhibition is here
with an example of the racism displayed.
And don’t anybody tell me that Meissner didn’t know that. He has a long
fundamentalist history.
As far as I can tell, his statement would also include members of religions which don’t worship his God. Like those artistically deficient civilizations in India or ancient Greece.
I’ve taken to answering “African” when asked about “race”.
After all, humanity originated in Africa, and we are all (descended from) Africans.
You’d be suprised (or maybe not) at how many people get all exited about that response.
A Catholic cardinal complaining about ritualism. My irony meter is in melted smouldering pieces all over Yorkshire.
“Papst”
What’s that supposed to mean?
Sometimes people say “degeneriert” instead, which is (obviously) a synonym. I just don’t know whether people who use it actually know that.
I couldn’t indetify myself racially as well. At least not in German. I could say “weiß” (white) but I don’t know where the “white race” begins and where it ends. Slavs for example are white as well, but are they included? What about Southern Europeans; they’ve got quite a dark skin, compared to Scandinavians.
In English I could say “Caucasian”, which would be politically correct in the US, if I’m not mistaken. But describing myself as “kaukasisch” in Germany would merely mean that I was born in the Caucasus Region.
So unless someone gives me his definition the of human races I would be in no position to identify myself “racially” in any meaningful way.
You cannot blame him, he most probably heard the term used around the house as a kid.
Actually, it’s not “degenerate” that has fallen out of use. The key is the combination “degenerate art”. “Entartet” is very much still used in the terminology of physics and chemistry. In any case, the fact that one finds this event noteworthy in such a blog is evidence of not knowing a lot about Meisner -he finds something to embarass himself with every year.
Um, I wonder if he knows that Dave Matthews is agnostic (Gee, I guess not). Or maybe he just moves the goalpost in cases like this and says “Non-believing artists are not real artists”
BTW, if you can get it by satellite or DSL, Deutsche Welle Tv or DW-TV, has lots of good programs in English. Several on science and technology. DW-Radio is also good.
http://www.dw-world.de/dw/0,2142,266,00.html
I call Morgan’s Law.
Yes, he said that — before the “and”.
Also, comment 42 is right: the term “entartete Kunst” seems to have been invented by the Nazis; anyway they used it a lot. If you say it, you identify yourself with them in more than one way. It wouldn’t have been quite the same if he had said “degeneriert” instead of “entartet”; in fact, “degeneriert” is the normal word, while “entartet” is very rare outside of “entartete Kunst” and a few (themselves very rare) technical terms. But no, he had to…
German is rather poor in swearwords. The scale tends to end at “asshole”. Comment 40 offers “pope”…
That’s quite likely, but it’s difficult to believe that he has never noticed the associations of that term.
BTW, as far as I can remember, I’ve never been asked to identify myself racially, except in a poll by the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology, which is headquartered in the USA.
I call Morgan’s Law.
Yes, he said that — before the “and”.
Also, comment 42 is right: the term “entartete Kunst” seems to have been invented by the Nazis; anyway they used it a lot. If you say it, you identify yourself with them in more than one way. It wouldn’t have been quite the same if he had said “degeneriert” instead of “entartet”; in fact, “degeneriert” is the normal word, while “entartet” is very rare outside of “entartete Kunst” and a few (themselves very rare) technical terms. But no, he had to…
German is rather poor in swearwords. The scale tends to end at “asshole”. Comment 40 offers “pope”…
That’s quite likely, but it’s difficult to believe that he has never noticed the associations of that term.
BTW, as far as I can remember, I’ve never been asked to identify myself racially, except in a poll by the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology, which is headquartered in the USA.
Managed to get a lot of gay folks kicked out of government, though. Far more people were purged for homosexuality (thanks Eisenhhower and EO 10460) than for communism.
David Marjanovic……Hi, my comment was intended to be facetious. As you say Its difficult to believe he did not understand the connoctation of the term. What is more laughable is that he was shocked by the publics reaction, he obviously has had a problems apprehending the majority of German peoples loathing of the nazis. As the jesuits say….give me a boy until he is seven and I will give you the man
What’s really funny about Meisner’s comments is that Jesus himself advocated keeping religion separate from cultural, financial and political concerns. No moneychangers in the Temple, no TIG-welding religion to political vehicles, none of that.
Ichthyic wins the internetz.
neither does anyone else, DCP, so that’s no great fault.
Re #4
>German is rather poor in swearwords. The scale tends to end at >”asshole”. Comment 40 offers “pope”…
Perhaps in higher German (and even there you get better words
than just asshole), but the various dialects (especially
Bavarian) offer a very wide choice of words.
A fitting one for this case (even higher German) would be Schweinepriester (pig’s priest)
Re #4
>German is rather poor in swearwords. The scale tends to end at >”asshole”. Comment 40 offers “pope”…
Perhaps in higher German (and even there you get better words
than just asshole), but the various dialects (especially
Bavarian) offer a very wide choice of words.
A fitting one for this case (even higher German) would be Schweinepriester (pig’s priest)
Cardinal Meisner is well known for his fundamentalism,and this is just the sort of comment he is renowned for,nothing new there ! And “degenerate” is close enough to “entartet”,so no ambiguities there.
Cardinal Meisner is well known for his fundamentalism,and this is just the sort of comment he is renowned for,nothing new there ! And “degenerate” is close enough to “entartet”,so no ambiguities there.
Hasn’t their capacity for embarrassment been burnt out by the Panzer Pope, unrepentant Hitler Youth?
Greetings from a degenerate composer! For another shameless plug, have a listen to my godless music here.
The term “entartet” – not a literal translation of degenerate, for, as several other commentors have pointed out, the term “degeneriert” also exists in German – was always used with political afterthoughts, at least in connection with art.
It was first used in such a way during the last decades of the 19th century by leftists and liberals, who called the works of Wagner, d’Annunzio, Baudelaire and the like “entartet”, because those artists had abandoned 18th and early 19th century enlightenment and positivism in favour of an obsession with the darker sides of life. Perhaps the 19th century liberals got it right, for at least d’Annunzio did indeed became a fashist in his later years. The term “entartet” was later hijacked by the political right and especially the Nazis, who used it to loathe modern art in general.
By using the politicised term “entarted” (that every German associates with the Nazis) rather than “degeneriert”, Meisner comitted a calculated outrage.
Ironically, by calling modern art ritualistic and atrophied, Meisner came very close to the stalinist definition of “formalism”, so he was actually borrowing a large part of his argument from godless communists…
DCP #41 asks, “Dickkopfig pangut.[*]
What’s that supposed to mean?”
In a mostly rural mixed dialect of German-Hungarian employed in the Hungarian/Austrian border region with many affinities to Yiddish, it is a fairly popular slam which basically means “strong(or “thick”)-headed idiot”.
But it has a much better impact within the culture than the English translation suggests, for it is a culture with an uncommonly robust sense of humor and the absurd.
*Sorry for the lack of the umlaut in the first word, (which is actually a fair substitution of a much more commonly used word that means the same thing but is well-nigh impossible to write out) but phonetically the proper pronunciation (in the dialect) is “DEEK-kope-feeg BONG-it”.
It really is a fine taunt, for best effect muttered under the breath but with sufficient emphasis to be heard – in public eliciting chuckles in those immediately within ear-shot. Its especially effective when reserved for special, solemn or otherwise serious occasions like referring to the priest or minister during a church service or a public official at a public speech.
In the church scenario the phrase has been known to lead to heroically-restrained laughing jags in a small portion of the congregation of such hysterical magnitude that the afflicted inevitably must spill out onto the street and head for the nearest tavern to medicine themselves. I have personally witnessed such an event myself, and I’ll never forget it.
@Arnosium Upinarum
Thanks for the clarification. I know what “dickköpfig” per se means, but “pangut” didn’t make any sense to me.
johannes, Cheers.
Pheonix Woman,….Says who?
DCP @59,
yeah. I’m moderately adept in Hun, yet Pangut was a new one for me. Ah well, German is, even today, intensely characterised by local dialects. Had Arnosium written Saubua damischer or dauba Nuass or chaibe Siach, all would have been clear to me.
Ho, you all linguaphiles/linguists! I am taking this discussion back to its original idea – the relationship of culture and religion. Perhaps one of you can help me with an interesting dilemma.
Indian classical music (by ‘music’, I include both vocal/instrumental music and dance forms) – one of the most complex and complete musical systems ever developed – has deep roots in both Hinduism and later Islam. The system was originally described in the Hindu holy scriptures, the Vedas, and has always been associated with spirituality and Vedic philosophy. Famous poets/philosophers and musicians of the past have been deeply religious, and their compositions – which are still sung even today – are all based on religious ideals, devotion to an abstract god or some deity, personification of mythological characters and attribution of human characters to them. This is very evident in the dance forms, which start by invoking a deity, and goes on in the same way.
Even the Islamic influence on Indian classical music was no different, and Muslim poets and singers sang about the Islamic god and Islamic philosophy – naturally reflecting a gentle, kind, soft image of Islam that is almost non-existent in today’s world.
Even in the southern part of India, where music and musical system evolved largely without Muslim influence, the music system, style, compositions etc. are almost entirely devotional in nature.
The religious component of Indian classical music is unarguably different from the militant, intolerant, radical and fundamentalist nature of today’s organized religions in India, Hinduism and Islam. It seems to be more of a philosophy than religion. The problem is, therefore, this: if one takes away the spiritual tradition of Indian classical music, the soul of the music is somehow lost. Without the spirituality that is the traditional backbone of Indian classical music, it is just an empty shell, bereft of character, depth and feeling.
The question is: what does a poor atheist (obviously, Indian!) do to reconcile his rationality with his culture and tradition?
I’ll overgeneralize and say that whenever someone claims that their quotations were “taken out of context”, the first response ought to be, “And in what context would your comments be appropriate?” In this case, if it isn’t a get-together of old Nazis at a mental institution, he needs to taper off on whatever mind-altering substances he is ingesting.
How do you say fucktard in German?
Papst?
Kausik Datta,
I find that hard to believe, unless it’s not actually very good music. We haven’t inherited the spiritual/religious traditions of the ancient Greeks and Anglo-Saxons, but we still recognize plenty of depth and feeling in the Iliad, or Beowulf. Stephen J. Gould famously wrote about loving Bach, while deploring the antisemitism expressed in his religious works. Why would our appreciation of Indian classical music be damaged by understanding its creators’ misconceptions about the world?
Besides, you say that its creators didn’t follow the versions of Hinduism and Islam which are followed by most modern Indians. That being the case, I don’t see why atheists would have a significantly harder time appreciating their culture than would modern believers.
Do you find yourself having trouble appreciating classical music?
Hmmm. I have no trouble recognizing the spiritual components of some of the world’s great music, even if I don’t believe in the religion that spawned it. Maybe it’s just my temperment, I don’t know, but think of it this way, perhaps it will help: Can you be profoundly moved by any great work of fiction, even knowing that it’s all made up? A novel, a movie, a play? If so, then why not music? Why must it lose its impact simply because so many people have believed, or still believe, that the foundation is based in fact even though you do not?
Here’s a piece of gospel music that is undeniably beautiful (to my ears) regardless of whether I subscribe to the religious beliefs from which the lyric springs.
As I understand it, the man who wrote it, Horatio Spafford, was a lawyer who lost much in the Chicago fire, then lost a son, then 4 daughters on a ship to Europe. Clearly this piece is the tangible result of his coming to terms with those great losses.
Wherever there is comfort, there is pain…
For extremely emotional but totally secular music I would nominate the symphonies of Shostakovich, especially the 5th, 7th, 10th and 13th. Very moving works, and no sign of religion anywhere.
Thank you very much, Kseniya and Anton Mates, for your comments. I don’t have trouble appreciating classical music, but I have a peculiar disconnect. By way of explaining, let me add a bit more to my previous post, actually one important point that I missed. There is this one important distinction between Indian and Western Classical music. Someone posted above about how some of the greatest composers of Western classical music were non-believers/atheists. I understand that it is not impossible to create a tune, a melody or a set of tunes, without any reference to spirituality or a divine being.
Even in Indian classical music, the rhythm, the set of notes and tones, the sequences themselves do not require any allusion to god. But in many major singing forms (as well as dance forms), it is customary to pay obeisance to the so-called divine origin of music, and to base the performance on a central composition that is devotional in nature. Perhaps I am not explaining it very well; the central ethos of Indian classical music is the spirituality that it supposedly embodies. And therein lies my disconnect.
Kseniya, I not only appreciate Indian classical music, but I also sing a little bit. My problem is that since I no longer feel the spirit of the lines that I am singing, the music comes out as empty. To take an example, one song praises the Mother Goddess who is battling forces of evil; another song visualizes Krishna, the Hindu god, as a child playing around his mother; yet another song, composed by a Sufi saint, talks about a gentle and loving Allah, asking him to bless the humankind. This sort of stuff.
It is possible to sing all that knowing that it is all made-up in a fairy tale sort of way, but would that rendition have the same depth of feeling, same richness, same moving quality? That’s what I don’t know. Our noted performers of Indian classical music (some of them are renowned and highly regarded the world over) all seem to be deeply religious as well (though whether they really are so in their personal lives, I have no idea).
I guess I am talking about proper appreciation of the nuances of this kind of music, understanding the language and appreciating the emotion behind. Somewhat like when you appreciate an Italian opera, but if you actually understand what is being sung in the piece because you know Italian, your appreciation is enhanced manifold.
I can still sing those with the same feeling, because I have had experience of spiritual belief (in the environment I grew up in). It would be interesting to know if someone, who grew up outside of a religious belief system, would still be able to appreciate Indian classical music in its entirety.
I hope you would comment on this further, Kseniya and Anton.
Wah wah wah, the big bad cardinal makes me cry. Most decent art ever created was religious in inspiration, the pinnacle coming from Catholicism as reformulated by Aquinas (the unity of Athens and Jerusalem, Christianity and Greece-Aristotle, exemplified in the greatest work of all – Michelangelo’s David). Atheist art tends to concern bullshit like gender, race and politics, repeating the same bland pieties (racism is baaaad) over and over in ever more indecipherable and decadent ways. Politics becomes the new religion when religion itself is removed from art. Most atheist art is leftist political propaganda created by talentless charlatans.
Kausik,
I wouldn’t be surprised if both performer and audience found it difficult to emotionally involve themselves as deeply in the music, after its subject shifted from truth to fiction so far as they were concerned. But I would still think they could reconstruct the feeling, were the music sufficiently compelling in itself. You don’t have to be a Freemason to be moved by Mozart’s Magic Flute, nor do you have to be a Christian to enjoy gospel.
Now if the music isn’t sufficiently compelling to produce those feelings without the assumption that it speaks theological truth, then I suppose there’s nothing you can do, other than to find another genre to enjoy. Maybe you’ll enjoy Christian gospel and Satanic death metal more now. :-)
Have there been any surveys on the religious habits of Indian classical aficionados?
Kausik Datta: Did the Carvakas and any of the non-religious schools of classical Indian philosophy create any art?