English practice 61

The Best Party

Here in the United States, comedians can sometimes seem to understand things better than do, people often jokingly suggest that comedians should run for office. But just this year, the small European island nation of Iceland went even further: it actually elected a stand-up comedian the mayor of its capital city of Reykjavik, and the political party he founded as a prank now controls more than a third of the seats on the City Council.

Comedian and film was already well known to Icelanders. In 2008, after devastated Iceland’s economy, he started a web site for a fictitious political party that he called the “Best Party” and began writing blogs satirizing the nation’s policies. When the web site became unexpectedly popular, Gnarr began the Best Party, mostly with people from the punk and alternative music scenes he has long been close to (Gnarr’s wife is best friends with Iceland’s most famous eccentric singer Björk).

Gnarr’s 2010 campaign for mayor of Reykjavik-which is only one city, but of Iceland’s population-was hardly a serious one. His campaign promises included free towels, more polar bears at the zoo, and a Disneyland at the airport. Still, the humorous platform serious issues: polar bears have recently been showing up in Iceland, where they did not live before, because of global warming.

[1] Though Gnarr did not expect to win, he has high hopes for his time in office. [2] Constant political shakeups have ejected Reykjavik’s last several mayors from office sooner than expected, and he hopes to be the first of the twenty-first century to serve out a full four-year term. [3] Gnarr says his surprise political career has given him “the greatest sense of contentment” of anything he’s ever worked on [4] This would be an impressive feat for someone who dropped out of school at age 16 and identifies himself as an anarchist, but the comedian has apparently gotten serious.

It is the world’s oldest parliamentary democracy, having had an elected legislature since 930 A.D. In 1117, it became the first European country to outlaw the slave trade. And in 2009, the people of Iceland elected Johanna Sigurthardottir as prime minister, making her the world’s first openly gay head of state. So is election of a comedian mayor and his satirical party a sign of things to come? Only time will tell.