Here it is in a nutshell.....
MUSIC!
I am sure you are scratching your head and wondering if I belong in a nutshell.
I have spent the past 25 years either listening to Disney soundtracks or giving up control of my car radio to the frantic fingers of my teenagers whose attention spans rarely ever let me hear what I wanted to listen to.
But no more.
I am in my car, well Bill's car, alone with nothing but the real estate signs rattling in the back.
So I turn on the radio.
My music of choice?
Er...well...mmm....okay okay.
I ADMIT IT! I like the current music and I like rap!
And by that I don't mean that I like to appear really cool in front of my kids or their friends by cranking up todays current hits and dancing in a style that they think was invented at the age of dinosaurs.
I mean I "secretly" like it and would rather not anyone know it.
After all I am a mature woman and proud of that fact.
But I am a product of the 70's and the disco beat still runs through my veins....
I wasn't born an old lady you know.
And even though the kids of today wouldn't admit it the beat is really still the same.
Infectious.
My problem is that since I have so much time to drive and think.....
I also have time to pay attention to the lyrics.
I mean...I knew some of them were not that great but I started to see a horrible pattern developing. A message woven like an ugly tapestry through the pounding of the mesmerizing beats.
Women are only used for one thing.
and
Guys should really just push that agenda until they get what they want.
The messages though repugnant to ME don't change my views but strengthen my desire to eradicate them.
I remember the first time I actually listened to the lyrics of "Tonight" by Enrique Iglesias.
I know you want me
I made it obvious that I want you too
So put it on me
Let's remove the space between me and you
Now rock your body
D#$@ I like the way that you move
So give it to me
Cause I already know what you wanna do
Here's the situation
Been to every nation
Nobody’s ever made me feel the way that you do
You know my motivation
Give in my reputation
Please excuse I don't mean to be rude
But tonight I'm loving you
Oh you know
That tonight I'm loving you
Oh you know
That tonight I'm loving you
I couldn't believe that given his "reputation" and knowing his "motivation" that ANY woman would want him. He does say "excuse me and I don't mean to be rude" and all but seriously!!
Enrique!....I don't care if you were the last man on earth and I was twenty years younger and the worlds fate depended on us procreating would I EVER let you come within 10 feet of my you international twerp!
It goes on to say a bunch of more offensive things which I guess are supposed to make a girl swoon.
Is this really how young girls expect to be wooed?
(I know using the word wooed here is a dead give away that I rode a dinosaur to school but it is a perfectly good word and by the sounds of our society needs to be not only brought back but defined!)
Ne-Yo's current song takes it even a step farther with the lyrics...
excuse me
but i might drink a little bit more than i should tonight
and i might take you home with me if i could tonight
and i think you should let me cause i look good tonight
and we might not get tomorrow
grab somebody sexy tell ‘em hey
give me everything tonight
give me everything tonight
give me everything tonight
give me everything tonight
Really!
Should I count myself lucky that you started with the word "excuse me" and were honest about the fact that you are drunk and did you REALLY just say that there might not be tomorrow?
Wow someone else used that line in a really popular book.
It's called the BIBLE and his name was Satan.
So thanks but no thanks....(see I have manners too)
And Maroon 5's new one...Moves like Jagger
I don't need try to control you
Look into my eyes and I'll own you
With them the moves like jagger.
It would take a little more than you prancing around like creepy Mick Jagger to control me and you would NEVER even have a shot in you know where to own me.
Now I don't like to get on a soapbox about things like this and I am past the point where I could be influenced by this pap, but, I still feel guilty.
I teach a Sunday school class of 12 and 13 year old young men and young women that might not exactly know who they really are yet and lyrics like these could really mess somebody up.
I don't want to become a crusader for better music since that rarely ever works.
I still remember a stake fireside when I was a youth were they tried to explain the impact that music was having on our teen age minds.
When they brought up the lyrics to "Momma's got a squeeze box", and said that there was a "double meaning" to it, we actually could not contain our laughter.
Laughed out loud there sitting on the church pews.
We thought that they were just so not with it and we were so impervious to any effects from music.
Now the lyrics to songs are not even encoded with secret messages about sexuality.
They just come out and boldly demand it.
(Well they do say excuse me and I don't mean to be rude)
And so I worry about the young people who are constantly barraged with these messages.
And I wonder what more I can do......
And I wonder if that means I have to stop listening to it too.
P.S. Excuse me Rihanna!! I don't mean to be rude but you are nasty.
4 comments:
I love love love reading your blog - you are such a great writer and hilarious!! I have this same problem. I have to admit that I make my teenagers turn off some of these songs when they are in the car but then I blast them when they aren't with me. SO WRONG!!! And I am the YW President - I should probably change with you. But I will think about that tomorrow. :)
Well, I have finally been able to listen to the radio WITH the kids in the car for about the last 2 years. It is heaven as I am so sick of Disney princess music. BUT...I bet over half the songs that come on I have to turn off immediately. That being said, I think teenagers usually aren't listening to the words. I'm still not on a lot of them. I like disco and rap too! So really, if there are not even noticing the words, as long as the words aren't TOO bad, I think we can just let it go (as parents, which is funny because yours are now grown and mine are still little kids). I do notice the words more now than I did before. Sometimes I listen. Sometimes I shut them off. Even when I am by myself.
Love that Maroon 5 song. It goes so fast my kids can't hear the bad stuff, but I hear it. I know it's there. Shame on me. And oddly, there is nothing sexy about Mick Jagger. Odd person he chose to sing about.
Heeeheehee . . . hmmm... oops! Didn't mean to chuckle out loud about such a serious subject . . . wait just a moment while I put my serious face on . . .
Oh heavens shame on me, I tried! My favorite song in college was by a guy named Rod Stewart, remember him? Something along the lines of "Do you think I'm Sexy", then there was Starland Vocal Band "Afternoon Delight" and Patti Labelle with "Lady Marmalade"
I do agree the lyrics seem to get worse and worse for outright vulgarity. We were listening to Pandora during family game night a couple weeks ago when all three of the now adult kids made a mad dash for the volume switch - I guess they knew what was coming - darn if the F%()( didn't slip about 5 times before they got the volume turned down! I know I didn't have to worry about that extremity of lyrics when I was raising my little ones - thank goodness.
Although I did have to chuckle the other day - I was in Raleigh visiting my 29 yo oldest son and was surprised he was watching the Simpsons! They were never allowed to watch the Simpsons when they were little - can't believe he actually LIKES that show!!
ME
Oh, this is all too funny. At one point in my life, being a teenager in the 80's, I grew to love punk. Yeah, I've said it. I have never liked hair bands because I was too cool for that. I've loved modern rock and punk. So I will turn to alternative music over anything else. And yes, the lyrics would make anyone blush sometimes, but thank goodness half the time I have no idea what they're saying. I still bang my head and enjoy it. So there. :-)
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