Ian Curtis, Joy Division and the idealized culture around them

TRIGGER WARNINGS: suicide, death and nazism; contains nazi imagery

From left to right: Peter Hook, Ian Curtis, Bernard Sumner and Stephen Morris.

As someone who has become a huge fan of Joy Division within a couple of months, after doing plenty of research, it’s come to my attention some bothersome behavior from media and the fan community overall — especially in regards to vocalist Ian Curtis, who took his own life at the age of 23.

Nearly no one treats Ian as a person, and interestingly enough, it happens in mainly two ways:

• The first one being that people treat Ian as this angel or god, this tortured soul who could do no wrong. He’s constantly idealized, you see his face plastered on a lot of Joy Division merch, and it’s pretty obvious how many tend to forget there were three other musicians in the band; not to mention that Ian wasn’t even the one to start the band to begin with. Obviously, I am not diminishing his importance in Joy Division, but not everything is about HIM. Everything the band has done is credited to him only (e.g. all the lyrics are solely about him — while yes, he was the main songwriter and many of them are personal and reveal his poor mental health, the JD members have all stated that the lyrics are still up to interpretation; thus allowing fans to resonate with their music);
• The other one, which is horrendous, is memes making fun of his death. You can find a few on the Tumblr tag for the band or Ian. Believe me or not, I’ve seen quite insensitive memes mocking Ian’s suicide, when he suffered from epilepsy and depression, and died horribly (by hanging) at such a young age… and yet some fans think it’s “edgy” to make fun of a mentally ill person’s death.

I even had the complete displeasure to find out that there is merch commercializing Ian’s suicide.

Ah, to be “edgy” and completely disregarding of suicide as a worldwide issue.

Basically, both of these treatments completely ignore that Ian Curtis was a real person. He wasn’t just the tortured soul everyone makes him out to be — his bandmates stated he liked to play pranks on them and he would mess around a lot… Once I found out how young Ian was, it hit me to realize that my older brother is the same age as his. Not to infantilize him, but you could say that Ian was still a kid when he died.

However, let’s not forget that Ian Curtis did do some harmful things. He was overly controlling over his widow Deborah Curtis, he and his band voted Conservative back in 1979, consequently helping Margaret Thatcher’s election… and while this is not only on Ian, it surprises me what seems to be overall ignorance in regards to Joy Division’s early associations with nazism. The name of the band itself is a nod to House of Dolls, a rather controversial book written by Ka-tzetnik 135633 that described “Joy Divisions” as groups of Jewish women who were used as sex slaves for Nazi soldiers. The book has been accused of being fiction and “torture porn”, and has been associated with nazi exploitation, while it’s still part of the Israeli high school curriculum. A Joy Division song, No Love Lost, even contains pieces of the book in the lyrics.

Cover for Joy Division (previously Warsaw)’s first EP, An Ideal for Living.

The cover of their first EP portrays a Hitler Youth member beating a drum. Back then, the band was already met with controversy for flirting with nazism. In fact, another one of their songs, Warsaw, recounted the story of a nazi deserter.

Plenty of their early songs and marketing revolved around nazi imagery and that shouldn’t be ignored. Even if you could argue that they weren’t actual nazis and only thought they were being “edgy” or being genuinely moved by the trauma of World War II, Joy Division still contributed to the fetishization and appropriation of nazi symbols and imagery that arose in the punk/rock/pop scenery (see Sex Pistols, Siouxsie and the Banshees and David Bowie for example). The remaining members of JD regret the name nowadays and would have chosen something else… though, when you think of it, New Order isn’t quite a well-thought band name, either.

Members of Siouxsie and the Banshees. The vocalist (middle), Siouxsie Sioux, is seen wearing a swastika armband in her left arm.

Sid Vicious and his girlfriend Nancy Spungen. He wears a t-shirt with a huge swastika plastered on it.

Anyway, I can at least appreciate that, by Unknown Pleasures, Joy Division no longer wrote songs related to nazism; and instead, their songs portrayed a pained and unique perpsective around depression, death, relationships and society overall. Still, I think people should be more aware of these things. People should acknowledge that Ian Curtis isn’t a deity, instead a human being that wasn’t all that great — while we can obviously sympathize with his pain, the pain of a mentally ill person who died very young. Additionally, I wish more people were more aware of their history when wearing Joy Division merch (not implying that all JD fans are misinformed, nor am I blaming/guilt-tripping people for not knowing about it, as I didn’t myself, but my point remains).

Again, this all comes from someone who loves Joy Division. I’m only writing about this because I don’t see a lot of discussion around their origins, their controversial aspects and who Ian Curtis really was. I feel as though these things should be discussed and brought up to newcomers to the Joy Division social circle, especially with so many young fans drawn to their music to this day.