I was driving home from work the other night and Wiz Khalifa's
Young, Wild & Free came on the radio.
Score. But as I was singing along, I came to realize that the lyrics had been changed. The part that I specifically noticed was that they no longer sang, "so what we smoke weed," and instead, "so what we don't sleep." Which I realize, is to stop any promotion of smoking the ganje [an illegal substance here in the good ole U S of A]. So on the forefront of my thought process about why KDWB (and I'm sure other stations across the country) had to change that minor line in the song, it made sense...whether you like it or not, marijuana is illegal.
But of course my mind wandered into thinking about all the other songs out there that promote inappropriate...stuff. I understand that radio stations have to cut out major profanity (i.e.
the 'f' word, etc), but what about
the lyrics themselves and their meanings? Although they may not all be so blatant as to say, "we smoke weed," the messages spoken may be just as damaging.
One song that comes to mind is one I've always had a bit of an issue with:
Carry Out, by Justin Timberlake and Timbaland. I am definitely guilty of just accepting the "it" songs and not questioning their meaning. But for some reason this one has always stuck and left a bad taste in my mouth, so I'm going to use it for a little comparison.
A few lines from the song in case it hasn't popped into your head yet....
"Let me get my ticket, baby, let me get in line"
"Baby get my order right, no errors"
"Take my order 'cause your body like a carry out"
Is there outright profanity or any suggestion of illegal activity? Nope. Is it profane and degrading? Absolutely. Essentially, this song says men should be able to get whatever they want from women, whenever they want, and their needs are all that matter. It's
dehumanizing and even contributes to violence against women. You might say I'm taking this too far, but in my mind, if it's already this bad, what's to come? And unfortunately, a lot of people take on a laissez-faire attitude and don't question popular culture. I know this isn't close to the worst of songs out there perpetuating similar ideas about sex, but it is one that was played on major radio stations right into the ears of young boys/girls/men/women everywhere. It doesn't need to be scouted out because it's all around.
So whoever is controlling the radio waves out there seems to think that smoking weed is not ok, but downgrading women is? Where is the line they draw for what's acceptable to play and what's not? If they take out the part about weed, why not go ahead and cease any lyrics in regard to alcohol? It's not a secret that youth [a.k.a. underage drinkers] are listening to the radio. We better not let them hear Wiz rap about how he drinks.
The fact of the matter is that kids are going to drink before they are 21, and people are going to smoke. And whether or not those few words are swapped out of a song isn't going to change things. But a song like
Carry Out; that represents such disrespectful and unhealthy attitudes
, that's done by two popular artists, and is catchy and fun, isn't going to be challenged by many people. And to me, that's
the bigger issue at hand.
