I’ve never really been able to separate the writing from the writer, the art from the artist, or the song from the singer. On some visceral level, in order for a performer to perform, my little heart of hearts absolutely BELIEVES that they too, must believe – that they’ve Lived the experiences they’re singing about. Love songs, political songs, surely SOMEONE in Jefferson Starship dated a woman named “Sarah” and obviously Michael Jackson must’ve had SOME sort of background in gang wars for him to understand how “Bad” they were?
Perhaps not. Michael and Paul couldn’t have sung so amiably about that girl they were fighting over, and I guess the monsters probably were never ACTUALLY witnessed mashing, but I always feel betrayed on some level when it turns out that some song was just a clever story, or sourced from Wikipedia, or even just something the artist thought of one day… it’s just what came out.
Social media, of course, rewards this behaviour on the micro level. People putting out random little half-thought thoughts and half-assed opinions that immediately garner likes and dislikes and angst and misinterpretations and overinterpretations, and I hate watching so many in the singer/songwriter community, theoretically such great communicators, bring that same “I wasn’t there but here’s my two cents” “I don’t really know about this but I’m going to write 10 paragraphs” half-assed half thought to news topics and Facebook Groups.
Where’s the AI flag that says “if you say you don’t know anything about it, should you REALLY click ‘post’”? It’s the same little thing that should put a red border around someone’s post that says “this individual has no formal education about climate change, please take this into account when reading their comments” or “there is no record of this individual having ever volunteered in a folk organization, please take this into account when reading their opinion”. We have such deep data mining on people – it’s a shame we can’t use these powers for good, only to make sure people see the things that will piss them off.
I absolutely believe that sometimes things have gone too far, that cauterization is the only solution. You burn it down and start from scratch. I vote not because I necessarily believe my voice will be heard, but because if I don’t, it DEFINITELY will NOT be heard. I get involved in organizations that I value, and I’m not going to get too involved in being opinionated about organizations that I don’t. I’m certainly not going to jump in with an opinion on something that I’m not knowledgeable about. I don’t understand those that do. I guess they’re just used to making noise, and having their “opinions” matter. For right or wrong, it undermines my faith in everything else they say.
Oh… right… this is a song from that guy who writes about stuff he’s never done, wasn’t involved with, and never really worked on. Nice melody. Wish I could have faith in what he was saying.