I imagine they'll need 3 years to get the joke. Thousands of cats and dogs and even AI have been hilarious on the internet, *almost* making it worth it - but we're still waiting on the first French offering that way. The Germans at least have the credibility of having picked the funniest Disney character in Scrooge McDuck.
Maybe the Olympic ceremony was them trying comedy? I didn’t see it.
The funniest thing to happen in the modern era in France was the time that guy who was a civilian air force employee reported to work on his last day before retirement, and became increasingly anxious as a "surprise" they had for him unfolded, turning out not to be a cake in the breakroom but a ride in a fighter jet. The whole thing was an absurdist misadventure, complete with failure to strap him in properly; and an utter misreading of his personality - and that was even before, in his nervousness, after enduring a "load factor of +4G" shortly followed by "a negative load factor of about -.6G" he reached for something to hold onto and accidentally ejected himself, without even a mask or a helmet for protection, as they had not bothered to secure these. Perhaps because his reluctance was so manifest they were extra-keen to get him quickly into the air.
The whole episode was like if Jacques Tati had actually done something funny.
But even that we can't really laugh at since it was so terrifying for the poor pensioner, although his injured after-insistence more on how much he had never wanted to do this, never expressed any desire to do this, more so than on how scary it was - somehow kept the tale from achieving pathos.
I admit though that I’m in the minority in admiring the decision to enlist the river and the architecture. To me the TV-friendly arena show seems a bit played out.
The hot air balloon seems really cool but if they wanted to be really edgy they could have had the lit cauldron ignite a model of Notre Dame as the blue Bacchus danced. Maybe next time.
Minimize athletes by not having them walk on parade, but stand on boats. Passing by platforms where performers danced hiphop, used skateboards, spun basketballs, rode bikes up and down on ramps.
Mock conservatives by showing Marie-Antoinette decapitated, carrying her severed head.
"Smurf" with genitals visible through his pants.
Have a performance by some rapper dressed in red singing about coming from the street yo and making aggressive gestures toward the camera.
Statues along the river of feminist icons, such as a woman who wrote a book "dreaming about a government of women," and another who in the French text was a "militant anarchist" (communist), but in the English translation on the screen was only called "anarchist".
Screen text told us that the Olympics symbolizes being against "racism," "oppression of women," "colonialism."
They of course had a Black woman singing the French national anthem, can't have anything White.
They had transvestites pretending to be in The Last Supper: Dressed in their various favorite dresses, in their clownish makeup, grinding back and forth and grinning like demons at the camera. With a "fat Jewish queer" homosexual mocking Jesus.
All installed by a homosexual.
"But homosexuals are just like other people, except that they have other habits in the bedroom." Sure.
Lebron James and Coco Gauff were the US flagbearers.
Here are the reasons:
Lebron (is there an uppercase letter in there somewhere? I can't be bothered to look it up) needs some exposure, a clap on the back for a job well done in a sport that no one pays attention to. He labors in obscurity and what does he get in return? Underpaid, overworked, he might as well be on a plantation.
Gauff, after winning one Grand Slam in singles, and one in doubles (and never going past the 4th round at Wimbledon) is similarly ignored and overlooked. She's only the richest active woman tennis player on earth and appears on front covers of magazines, expounding on politics, but she, too, is passed over because she is a nameless, faceless Black woman.
Meanwhile, Katie Ledecky is the greatest American woman swimmer ever, maybe the greatest woman swimmer, by an order of magnitude, and gets to march with the crowd.
BTW I don't mean to slight Gauff's achievement - winning a Slam at age 19 is a feat.
But she has a very janky forehand that's prone to breakdown in important singles matches and if she weren't black, I mean Black, she wouldn't be gushed over and wouldn't make half of what she does.
PS She's the richest woman *athlete* not woman tennis player.
I have no problem with a little deviance - but by definition, it's not for everyone. Why France would want to put on that kind of opening ceremony is just strange to me.
Why we must constantly celebrate every far flung corner of the human experience then get mad when everyone doesn't embrace it is beyond me. I enjoy plenty of strange and niche things and am glad I have the freedom to as an American. But I also don't need everyone to celebrate any of those things en masse either. Tolerance vs acceptance, the story of America today ("acceptance" is irony drenched as most of us feel forced not to just allow but celebrate every weird thing that occurs to some microscopic slice of the population)
I just wrote a similar comment - I lived in Paris at the same time. Funny!
France has been noticeably behind every cultural and technological phenomenon since WW2.
I think the French elite cultural class today thinks that gender-bending is à la mode even though it peaked elsewhere about 2019.
As the joke goes, when the nuclear apocalypse happens I’d rather be in France as everything arrives there three years late.
I imagine they'll need 3 years to get the joke. Thousands of cats and dogs and even AI have been hilarious on the internet, *almost* making it worth it - but we're still waiting on the first French offering that way. The Germans at least have the credibility of having picked the funniest Disney character in Scrooge McDuck.
Maybe the Olympic ceremony was them trying comedy? I didn’t see it.
The funniest thing to happen in the modern era in France was the time that guy who was a civilian air force employee reported to work on his last day before retirement, and became increasingly anxious as a "surprise" they had for him unfolded, turning out not to be a cake in the breakroom but a ride in a fighter jet. The whole thing was an absurdist misadventure, complete with failure to strap him in properly; and an utter misreading of his personality - and that was even before, in his nervousness, after enduring a "load factor of +4G" shortly followed by "a negative load factor of about -.6G" he reached for something to hold onto and accidentally ejected himself, without even a mask or a helmet for protection, as they had not bothered to secure these. Perhaps because his reluctance was so manifest they were extra-keen to get him quickly into the air.
The whole episode was like if Jacques Tati had actually done something funny.
But even that we can't really laugh at since it was so terrifying for the poor pensioner, although his injured after-insistence more on how much he had never wanted to do this, never expressed any desire to do this, more so than on how scary it was - somehow kept the tale from achieving pathos.
I admit though that I’m in the minority in admiring the decision to enlist the river and the architecture. To me the TV-friendly arena show seems a bit played out.
The hot air balloon seems really cool but if they wanted to be really edgy they could have had the lit cauldron ignite a model of Notre Dame as the blue Bacchus danced. Maybe next time.
Opening ceremony:
Minimize athletes by not having them walk on parade, but stand on boats. Passing by platforms where performers danced hiphop, used skateboards, spun basketballs, rode bikes up and down on ramps.
Mock conservatives by showing Marie-Antoinette decapitated, carrying her severed head.
"Smurf" with genitals visible through his pants.
Have a performance by some rapper dressed in red singing about coming from the street yo and making aggressive gestures toward the camera.
Statues along the river of feminist icons, such as a woman who wrote a book "dreaming about a government of women," and another who in the French text was a "militant anarchist" (communist), but in the English translation on the screen was only called "anarchist".
Screen text told us that the Olympics symbolizes being against "racism," "oppression of women," "colonialism."
They of course had a Black woman singing the French national anthem, can't have anything White.
They had transvestites pretending to be in The Last Supper: Dressed in their various favorite dresses, in their clownish makeup, grinding back and forth and grinning like demons at the camera. With a "fat Jewish queer" homosexual mocking Jesus.
All installed by a homosexual.
"But homosexuals are just like other people, except that they have other habits in the bedroom." Sure.
When I lived there in the late 80's the gay scene was big, and the Bois de Boulogne was filled with Les Brazilliennes (transvestites for hire).
Lebron James and Coco Gauff were the US flagbearers.
Here are the reasons:
Lebron (is there an uppercase letter in there somewhere? I can't be bothered to look it up) needs some exposure, a clap on the back for a job well done in a sport that no one pays attention to. He labors in obscurity and what does he get in return? Underpaid, overworked, he might as well be on a plantation.
Gauff, after winning one Grand Slam in singles, and one in doubles (and never going past the 4th round at Wimbledon) is similarly ignored and overlooked. She's only the richest active woman tennis player on earth and appears on front covers of magazines, expounding on politics, but she, too, is passed over because she is a nameless, faceless Black woman.
Meanwhile, Katie Ledecky is the greatest American woman swimmer ever, maybe the greatest woman swimmer, by an order of magnitude, and gets to march with the crowd.
Go figure.
In 2028 in Los Angeles, the torchlighters will likely be Serena Williams and Magic Johnson.
Michael Phelps' 23 gold medals?
Eh ...
Or someone of similar hue...
BTW I don't mean to slight Gauff's achievement - winning a Slam at age 19 is a feat.
But she has a very janky forehand that's prone to breakdown in important singles matches and if she weren't black, I mean Black, she wouldn't be gushed over and wouldn't make half of what she does.
PS She's the richest woman *athlete* not woman tennis player.
https://www.palmbeachpost.com/story/sports/tennis/2023/12/19/coco-gauff-delray-beach-pay-net-worth-ray-ban-meta-glasses/71974310007/
I have no problem with a little deviance - but by definition, it's not for everyone. Why France would want to put on that kind of opening ceremony is just strange to me.
Why we must constantly celebrate every far flung corner of the human experience then get mad when everyone doesn't embrace it is beyond me. I enjoy plenty of strange and niche things and am glad I have the freedom to as an American. But I also don't need everyone to celebrate any of those things en masse either. Tolerance vs acceptance, the story of America today ("acceptance" is irony drenched as most of us feel forced not to just allow but celebrate every weird thing that occurs to some microscopic slice of the population)
Was that architecture presaging the demon core?
I went to Paris for a conference and was pre- jaded for the experience, what a tourist trap what a nest of cliches it was gonna be
….and I was blown away. How can a city that gets so many tourists still have so much real charm?
On the other hand you also had Michel Foucault, Paris's most celebrated pederast. Also lesser lights like Marcel Proust.
Re. the Newton Cenotaph:
Build it.