To our readers, supporters, and people who accidentally visited this page while trying to go to a different blog --- we are terribly sorry for the neglect the blog has received over the last four months. The one month hiatus that we planned to take in October turned into a four month hiatus. Many of the reasons for this include the word "homework". This is my attempt to get the ball rolling again. We are very sorry about this long and unintended hiatus! Here is a picture of a baby wombat curled up in a hat to make up for it. We will also discuss the possibility of running the blog a few months longer than we had originally planned.
| Awwww... Don't you just love wombats? (I do not own this, or any images in this post) |
Now to my post:
While lamenting the many hours of homework that I am behind in, I often listen to music. And while listening to music, I've started to notice that a lot of popular songs that seem to have a nice message, often actually have a mixed message if you listen to the lyrics. What am I talking about?
Well, take the song "All About that Bass" by Meghan Trainor. I quite like the message that people come in different sizes, and to not be ashamed if you're not a size two (though I always feel odd singing that line because I happen to be a size two). However her reasons for this are that "...don't worry about your size, because boys like a little more booty to hold at night". I don't quite like that message. The only reason to feel good about how you look is if boys like you? That doesn't seem quite right. I don't like her endorsement of placing your self-worth on what someone else thinks. The song has a mixed message. The positive message: bodies come in different sizes, don't hate yours. The negative message: Base how you feel about your body on what others say and think. So, don't hate your body if boys like it. What seemed a feminist song, now doesn't seem very feminist anymore. Some of Meghan Trainor's other songs have mixed messages too.
Take "Dear Future Husband", a song about what the singer's "future husband" has to do to be her future husband. A lyric with a positive message: "...so don't be thinking I'll be home and baking out the pies." She's saying don't expect me to stay at home while you go to work, which implies that both will be working to support each other. But another lyric "After every fight, just apologize... Even if I was wrong, you know I'm never wrong. Why disagree?" implies that the singer is never in the wrong, and will never have to apologize. That goes against the lyric about an equal relationship. This new lyric implies that the man will do all the work in the relationship (apologizing, negotiating, etc.), and the woman won't do any and always get her way. This goes against the previous lyric of both people working for the relationship. Overall this song is a fun song, but I don't enjoy the lyrics, because in the relationship the singer is not taking an equal share of the work or responsibility, but leaving all the changes that need to be made for their relationship to work to her "future husband".
Another song with a mixed message is "Daughters" by John Mayer. I like the melody and sound of the song, but I have a problem with the lyrics. He starts out with a lovely message for fathers to treat their daughters well. He goes on to say that girls will eventually become mothers, so mothers should be good to their daughters too. I'm a little bothered by the first bit of that, because not every girl has to be a mother, but the overall message is still fine: parents should treat their daughters well. But what really bothers me is when he gets to this part: "Boys you can break. Find out how much they can take. Boys will be strong, boys soldier on, but would be gone without warmth from a woman's good good heart." Um, what? So be nice to your daughters because they are weak, but go ahead an mistreat your sons because they are tough and mistreating them will make them strong and manly? Huh?First of all, be good to all of your children. Not just the girls. Second of all, girls are not inherently weaker than boys, and boys are not inherently stronger than girls. Third of all your decision about whether or not to be nice to your children should not take their gender into account, and fourth of all don't mistreat any of your children. Even if they're boys. Those lyrics almost ruin the song for me. The message in the song: Be nice to girls, but mistreat boys because they are stronger than girls.
It seems that in a lot of songs, just as they have a nice social message going, they insert a lyric with a negative social message and end up neutralizing the song. But yet we keep listening, because we like them, and if you ignore the one lyric or two, they're nice songs. Still, I wish there were more songs with lyrics you don't have to ignore to enjoy the song.
-- Captain Sarah Jane
