To wonder why this song is still ok to play on the radio

[CoedynSbageti]

Jealous Guy

Written and performed by a man who admitted he was violent towards women.

Just that really.

Elton
It's interesting that you quote the very speech from MoV that is the best evidence for Shakespeare's sympathy for Shylock and also state categorically that Shakespeare was not sympathetic to him and was simply perpetuating vicious stereotypes of Jews. Do you really think that Shakespeare was that simple-minded?

Anyway, this is not about Shakespeare. It's about pop songs. A very different genre, not least because of the convention of association between the voice of the song and the singer him or herself.

I think you've misunderstood my position. I'm not particularly angry about the particular John Lennon song. I know the song, but I think it's mild in comparison to many others by other artists in terms of dodgy attitudes.

But the issue is wider than that. Your pal bfg has even included references to Friends and become angry about some article pertaining to that. Some people are angry at the very notion of analysing popular culture and objecting to some of it. That, in my opinion, is a stupid attitude. We should always challenge our assumptions, rather than yelling 'snowflake' if someone wonders aloud if a certain song might be a bit 'off'.

Do you really think that Shakespeare was that simple-minded?

I think Shakespeare was a man who lived in the 16th and 17th century when anti-semitism was the norm and concepts like racism didn't even exist, let alone disapproval of them. Just because you can't imagine a past with different values and prevailing wisdom doesn't mean they didn't happen.

I also think the speech in context, Shylock asking for empathy as a human being, when he has refused to do the same for others, means it is ambiguous.

The reading that it is an anti-racist tract is largely one which comes from modern interpretation through the lens of modern ideas and probably not what Shakespeare intended.

The point I was making is that people interpret art/music given their own set of values, and are capable of making value judgements. So we don't view Shylock as a weedling old Jew begging for mercy he wouldn't give others as many 17th century audiences would. We see it through the prism of the holocaust and the equality movement as an impassioned speech for equality and common humanity.

Things like Jealous Guy are the same. We are adults. We can interpret and make up our own minds. We don't need Mary Whitehouse figures burning books and suppressing things they see as morally dubious.

Honestly, this sort of thinking is how dictatorships start. It's fucking sinister.

Gosh, you are being very belligerent Elton

Of course I can imagine different values. I think Shakespeare could too. Not everyone in his day had the exact same views and prejudices, and besides, he wasn't exactly your average man in the street.

It suits you to portray me as some Mary Whitehouse character. Nothing could be further from the truth. I don't advocate banning anything on these grounds. But I wish we could have a discussion where we analyse why certain lyrics don't even seem to raise an eyebrow without people screaming 'snowflake'. Being critical is not being a snowflake.

Oh, and please don't try to patronise me about Shakespeare. I actually make a living teaching literary texts.

why certain lyrics don't even seem to raise an eyebrow

Probably because Jealous Guy is about John's jealousy of Paul's success....

Do you Golden? I have to say I'm surprised you don't have a bit more knowledge of 16th century history and the rest of the antisemitism of the 'Merchant of Venice".

It's really weird you're determined to transfer your values onto Shakespeare when there's no evidence that type of thinking was present at the time. They were still killing each other for being the wrong sort of Christian FFS.

But I wish we could have a discussion where we analyse why certain lyrics don't even seem to raise an eyebrow without people screaming 'snowflake'. Being critical is not being a snowflake.

Nobody said it was. But you're (again) transferring your prejudices onto every other person who is listening or viewing. You're claiming 'it doesn't raise an eyebrow'. Well this thread shows that actually for many other people it does.

You're just assuming that all the other little people can't possibly be as superior as you and understand what they are listening or watching and that they're just thoughtlessly dribbling while consuming. Now if you want patronising, then that's it.

Your pal bfg has even included references to Friends and become angry about some article pertaining to that. Some people are angry at the very notion of analysing popular culture and objecting to some of it

You misunderstood. My problem was not with analysing it, but with analysing it so stupidly, with such little insight and such amazing bias.
You should be furious with these fools. They are the same people who want art removed from galleries because they think that paintings from a hundred years ago should reflect the current attitudes to depictions of women.

Nobody said being critical is being a snowflake. It's being such a drivelling snowflakey biased fool of a critic that is the issue.

Elton

You're just being silly and simplistic. What evidence do you have about my knowledge of anti-semitism or lack thereof? My point was merely that it's not as straightforward as 'Shakespeare was an antisemite because they all were back then" - which is what you seem to be saying. Obviously his society as a whole was anti-semitic; that's a given. But it's not a given that a man of Shakespeare's insight was incapable of thinking beyond the values of his day. Do you think all his characters are "goodies" or "baddies"?!

You think Shakespeare wrote only his own feelings and values, or shows us what was prevalent and popular opinion in his time? How well liked do you think he would have been if his characters showed values wildly different to those of his audiences? And why would he have been any different to anyone else?

Captain

I absolutely bow to your superior knowledge of 'Jealous Guy', but I wasn't referring to that actually. The discussion has moved on, and I'm referring to the way that, if anyone dares question any values inherent in pop culture, they're branded 'snowflakes' by some posters. The OP's example is by no means the only one; there are thousands of songs full of misogyny and, it seems, we lap them up without stopping to think.

bfg

You seem to be labouring under the idea that everyone was stupid in the past. They weren't a homogenous mob with one point of view.

Shakespeare was controversial. Frequently.

The discussion has moved on
Yes, but I like any excuse to talk about the Beatles.

You seem to be labouring under the idea that everyone was stupid in the past. They weren't a homogenous mob with one point of view

Are you on glue? My comments were about people being stupid now.
You seem to think that saying a popular playwright reflected the values of his day means that the people then were stupid...which really only proves my point about the gombeens who are doing the analysing now.

You should be furious with these fools. They are the same people who want art removed from galleries.

You're creating another simplistic little arrative there!

So... the very same people who sometimes listen to the lyric of, say, a rap song (about, I don't know, controlling your woman) and think "Hang on, I'm not sure that's good to hear" are the EXACT same people who definitely want loads of paintings taken down? Okaaaayy...

No bfg you were implying they were stupid by suggesting they all had this one viewpoint that Shakespeare had to stick to in every play...

For example, the prevailing view was that women were gentle, nurturing etc. Enter Lady Macbeth. Yes, people were generally shocked. But they coped.

No I was not. If you stupidly inferred that its not my problem, its not even slightly what I was implying.

Oh. My apologies. What did you mean then? You did seem to be saying that Shakespeare had to pander to a specific set of values due to his audience... didn't you?

That's not how it reads.

How well liked do you think he'd have been if his characters showed values that differed wildly from those of his audiences

This, to me, implies that you think a) his audiences had very homogenous views and b) they somehow couldn't cope with having their values challenged. Sounds like they might be a bit... stupid??

LOTS of songs especially old ones that are now considered to have distasteful content from romanticising infidelity (saving all my love for you - anyone?), teen pregnancy (gypsies, tramps and thieves - so some racism and slut shaming too) to dv, paedophilia, violence, drug use, date rape, stalking, even serial murder! Are great songs! If we banned them all we'd just be left with asinine crap like Erm...

All that said there are certain artists I personally won't listen to. But generally speaking I disagree with censorship. I'm an adult I can choose what music/film/books/art I partake of. The really offensive stuff tends not to sell well anyway so economic censorship occurs.

I take your

Every breath you take

And raise you

Don't stand so close to me

Fekko it wasn't written by Cyndi lauper not even FOR her but by Steinberg/kelly

"We'd better ban all of Richard Strauss's music then. He was openly racist and very popular with the Nazis." And Wagner

I take the view art isn't just about entertainment/pleasure it's about making people think, question their beliefs and values and that applies as much to popular music as other art forms. I think eninem has commented on this quite a bit. So I also don't agree with the "ffs it's just a song" view. Everything influences society and peoples behaviour, adverts, songs, tv shows, film... I LOVE friends but even at the original airtime there were some lines/storylines that were distinctly dodgy.

What I DO Agree with is a "son of Sam" type laws - if an artist is convicted of a crime which is relayed or alluded to in a work of theirs, they shouldn't profit from that. (Would LOVE this to be applied to the like of Woody Allen, Polanski...)

I don't imagine that Shakespeare would ever have met a Jewish person, as they had been banned from living in England in the 1200s and the ban wasn't lifted until the 1650s.

Shakespeare's knowledge of Jewish people would have been non-existent, and so when he created the highly unsympathetic character of Shylock, there was no reason to make him anything more than a caricature based on contemporary attitudes to Jews.

The attempts to downplay the anti-Semitism in MOV strike me as silly, but perhaps they come from concern that some bunch of idiots will try to ban the play, instead of using it to understand historical anti-Semitism.

Don't stand so close to me

I actually just don't get why anyone would have any beef with this song. It's message is simply "Teachers should resist the temptation to shag schoolchildren, otherwise everyone gets hurt".

The comparison with "the old man in that book by Nabakov" is an absolutely crushing line, showing how pathetic, stupid and deluded the teacher has become. There's no equivalent line for the girl; only implicit sympathy for the bullying she undergoes.

Jealous Guy is on radio two, now.

Sheesh Kebab. Are people not allowed to analyse popular culture and what it reveals about the social acceptability of certain values without the anti-PC brigade coming on and hysterically shouting "snowflake"?

What makes me laugh is that all those Snowflake-hunters is that they think they're fighting against the mainstream, when in fact they are the mainstream.

a caricature based on contemporary attitudes to Jews

If you think Shylock is a caricature of any sort, I doubt you've read the play. There are anti- semitic ideas in the play- of course there are. Shakespeare wasn't actually a time traveller with complete immunity to the baked-in racism of his time. But look at Othello. Yes, he's got some uncomfortable stereotypical and racist attributes - but he's far from the bad guy: he's the most eloquent character in the play, and the amount of sympathy he still gets in modern productions, as he stands there moaning about how people are going to remember him, whilst two women lie dead on the floor.... I digress. But it brings us nicely back to the fact that in our culture we often don't notice misogynistic attitudes. They're woven in. It won't kill us to stop and listen to the lyrics that pervade our airwaves and, you know, think.