The mind works in strange ways.  My work is very busy and stressful right now and while feeling exhausted and somewhat depressed, my mind flashed on "Give up!"... which means that this was quickly followed by an earworm from a song from the 1980's that represents some common OS themes boiled down to their hard edge.

The band is Negativland, who are not really a band but are more performance artists who specialize in "found sounds."  The song is "Christianity is Stupid."

This song has had a multi-layered existence.

• It originates with Negativland sampling from a fantasy section of a 1971 film promoting Christianity as the anti-toxin against Communism.  I never knew this until I decided to write this post and did some research.
• It becomes known as "The Killer Song" when Negativland, as a publicity stunt, issue a news release denying that the song was the catalyst for a teenager who axe murders is family.  This results in many local news stations doing news reports about the song and the murder.  I recall this from the time.
• Almost twenty years after its release, the band makes a film for the song (a music video in 80's parlance).  The film uses samples from many films including The Passion of the Christ and is part of Negativland's advocacy of fair use in copyright debates.  Here is that video.  I like the fan video using the Metropolis scenes better so that it what I chose to embed above.

Why Should This be the OS Theme Song? (tongue in cheek!)

The vocals consist of spoken words repeated over and over:

The loudspeaker spoke up and said.

Christianity is stupid.

Communism is good.

Can you hear that?

Give Up!

From five o'clock in the morning till ten o'clock at night!

Seventeen hours a day.

So, to even casual readers of OS, it is obvious that recurring OS themes are reflected.

• There are numerous OS posts denouncing religion, especially Christianity, and promoting atheism.
• There are many posts advocating that the government take on the role of allocating resources... and denouncing individual ownership and choice in free markets as selfish and evil.
• The "give up" could refer to couple of things.  It could be OSers' desire for conservative opponents to go away and stop talking.  Or, on a more personal level, it could refer to the simultaneous self-pity and self-importance expressed in the "flounce posts"... especially from people have done this multiple times and return within days.
• However, the good news is that OS is up most of the time so there is not a constraint limiting people to 5:00am to 10:00pm.

What Might the Song Really Mean?

Well, based on this video, Mark Hosler from Negativland basically admits that they just found the sound of the spoken words interesting so they chose to build a song out of it.  They intentionally avoided adding other content that might provide a hint to their individual perspectives.

When I originally bought the record (yes, vinyl!) years ago, I did not know that the vocal parts were sampled from an anti-communist film.  So, I created an interpretation that treated the lyrics as stand-alone.

The key line to me was the part about "5:00 in the morning to 10:00 at night."  My take was that it was easy to denounce religion and embrace anti-individual philosophies during the normal parts of the day when people are absorbed in activity and do not have to be too self-reflective.  But, when we end up in the dark quiet of night and our minds turn inward, we become less cocky in these beliefs and there is something innate in us that reaches out for meaning as individuals.

Basically, it is a different version of the old adage that there are no atheists in foxholes... with the added idea that people advocate communism until they are denied something they believe they have earned through hard work.

Anyhoo, I doubt many people will like this song either way.