'Nothing Compares to U'

The Korea Times

The Korea Times

Opinion

Jason Lim

'Nothing Compares to U'

Posted : 2023-08-03 16:35

Updated : 2023-08-03 16:35

By Jason Lim

Sinead O'Connor has died. As you get older, hearing about the deaths of people that you knew ― either personally or as a public figure ― is increasingly frequent and marked with only passing curiosity except in certain cases where you feel compelled to pause. This is one of those times.

There is no particular reason why someone's death lingers with you with a deeper resonance than others. O'Connor had no rational footprint on my cognitive real estate, at least nothing that I could point to consciously. Then you realize that she must have remained deep inside you as something of an invisible kernel, gathering sheen and significance in the subconscious darkness as it layered itself into a pearl of dawning understanding.

As with everyone else, O'Connor imprinted herself in me as the impossibly beautiful ―angelic, even ― face in the "Nothing Compares to U" video that was ubiquitous in the early 1990s. I remember the jokes about Sinead O'Connor being the prettiest bald girl alive. Which she was. Those impossibly huge eyes stared right through you even on the TV screen as she beckoned, nay challenged, you to listen to her words and understand her message. The edgy pain was there for all to see, barely masked and commoditized by the video production. Her beauty was incomparable, her voice beatific, but her singing was discomforting. It was strangely disturbing and laden with a heaviness that seeped into your heart while you admired her beauty and voice. You actively didn't want to look too deeply inside the darkness that she was pleading with you to enter.

Then it happened. She ripped up the photo of the pope. Not just any pope. John Paul II, who had survived his own assassination attempt by the Soviet KGB, thereby becoming a beacon of freedom and democracy. He was regarded as a saint even before his death. She couldn't have picked anyone more universally loved and revered. Or more symbolic of the Western values that had just crushed the Evil Empire.

She didn't insult the man. She insulted the institution. Not just the Catholic Church. By ripping up the photo of the pope, she insulted the whole of the West at the exact moment of its revelry in its own sense of superiority in the aftermath of the Cold War victory. She had just insulted the dominant civilization of her times at the height of its power. She sure knew how to pick 'em.

I saw what happened live since watching Saturday Night Live was a ritual of mine in the early 1990s. I have to admit that it was shocking. The fact of what had just happened collided with all that was represented by the pope and, by extension, us. In the most jarring way possible, she had just thrown cold water at our collective moral exuberance and called out the self-contradiction and hypocrisy deeply embedded in our world that had manifested as violence against the most innocent and vulnerable. You are no better, she mocked. No wonder we were angry.

But it was more than that. Looking back, there was definitely a "Who the hell are you to say that to me?" type of righteousness in our collective anger. We wanted O'Connor to be this curated, beautiful, innocent product that was nestled safely within our expectations of what a pop singer should be. As an audience, we would only tolerate performance outrage or rebelliousness from our entertainers within acceptable constraints, not a real challenge to the core illusion at the heart of the civilization. She gave the whole world the middle finger on live TV. We wanted her to be a performer while she insisted on being a prophet.

There is an old saying in Korean that says, "An ignorant person is a courageous person." Ignorant not as in stupid, but ignorant as in unaware. Maybe that's what she was at that time. Otherwise, such courage is unfathomable.

At the same time, I remember the music video giving us glimpses of old Greek or Roman statues. I never found out what they were, but they seemed to be ancient gods and goddesses, in apparent ruins but still exercising a powerful hold over our psyches. Maybe that's what she wanted to covey. That she was running from her own past and yet longing for it.

The "U" in the song wasn't a lover. It was her past, her trauma, her abuser, her mother and her home, all wrapped up in a longing that's as powerful as lethal that we can never truly get away from. Nor do we really want to since it's all that we know deep down. We can't help but be prisoners of our own past traumas, being drawn in like a moth to a flame, but with a painful awareness of the impending pain of the burning.

Ultimately, maybe it was that past that reached up and finally dragged her down. Rest in peace, Sinead O'Connor. Truly nothing compares to you.

Jason Lim (jasonlim@msn.com) is a Washington, D.C.-based expert on innovation, leadership and organizational culture.