Sunday - December 21, 2003
Who? The Who, that's who. But who cares?
I was driving to College Station today to watch
my friends drive on the track, when a song came on the radio. It was a common
song, one I've heard innumerable times. I don't even remember which one it was,
but it was a typical song from the seventies about youthful rebellion and
seeking freedom.
After witnessing the
events of this past year, I was struck by how petty this song's cry for freedom
is in comparison to the freedom being sought by the Iraqis. They are
celebrating the end of torture. The Who were whining about . . . well, it's
not even clear what they were whining
about.
Ayn Rand survived the onset of
Communism in Russia before escaping to the United States and her opinion on this
topic is worth reviewing.
Ayn Rand expressed nothing but disdain for the
60's anti-war demonstrators when they talked of how wonderful our country is
because of the music we could listen to. Even in the worst times of the Soviet
Union, she claimed, people listened to whatever style of music they wished. The
communists could and did control many things, but this wasn't on their list.
Equating musical style choices with freedom is intellectual
abandonment.
So while I was thinking
about the potential that Iraq now has, the end of their terror, tortures and the
destruction of the Ba'ath party and fascism, I hear a mod rock band whining
about how hard they have it in modern society and it sounded so trivial, so
moronic.
Since the end of the Second
World War, western civilization has been on an economic and technological
rocket. I was talking with my mother and her friend over Thanksgiving and
learned that they grew up with one bath tub at the neighbor's house. I grew up
with the luxury of having a second bathroom for the four of us kids. I don't
know many families that don't have several cars and several bathrooms. Heck, I
live by myself and I have two bathrooms! We live very good lives in the United
States now. We have almost nothing to complain about, so our music and our art
are reduced to triteness.
But the
people of Iraq aren't so fortunate. I expect they aren't singing about mods
versus punks. They don't complain about their parents grounding them. They're
more concerned with whether psychopathic dictators are going to send goons to
knock on their doors in the middle of the night and stand them up against a
wall.
The more we get involved in Iraq,
and the more we witness their struggle to be free, the more our culture of our
youth, especially from the sixties and seventies, seems pathetically
narcissistic.
I guess if being
narcissistic is the price of having decades of freedom, then it's worth paying.
It's just a shame that what our culture learned in the 40's from witnessing
German, Italian, Japanese and Spanish fascism has been so thoroughly forgotten.
I wonder if The Who can watch what's happening in Iraq and make some music
reminding us of how wonderful our freedom is.
Go Back to the Start, Do Not Collect $200 Send me your two cents
|
