I never look for offense, but "Do They Know its Christmas Tume" lyrics...

[SecondUsername4me]

I mean, it's a bit iffy right?

And there won't be snow in Africa this Christmas time,The greatest gift they'll get this year is life

The whole of Africa?

Where the only water flowing, Is the bitter sting of tears

On the whole continent?

Well tonight thank God it's them instead of you

Err.....

How about

"Ethiopians will see no snow this Christmastime"

Considering it was written by someone who has lived his life off the profits of a song he write about a mass murder in a school, the lyrics don't surprise me. Bob geldof is very astute and I suspect not a particularly nice person.

Why is that a "consideration" at all? 🙄

I let him once and he was perfectly pleasant and down to earth.

Does anyone else remember being 12/13 around the time of Band Aid and Live Aid etc we all did the don’t eat for 24 hours and get sponsored by adults to raise money for the starving (teachers and parents encouraged it but didn’t do it themselves) or adopt a child in Africa? I remember begging my mum for that one for my Christmas present! Back then we (well can’t speak for anyone else) I wanted to feel as though I was doing something. That I was helping kids my own age. That I wanted to help kids of my own age because I had never heard of anything like this before.

The original line is 12 syllables. That’s 13. So closer, but still no. And lyrically shit too. We all understood Africa was being used as shorthand.

Let him what?

@Dartmoorcheffy I think Bob Geldof has probably had enough sadness in his life to get a pass.

In a lot of ways the song, and that whole famine, represented a new era in global fundraising of that kind. Very muh pushed by television showing images that were new to a lot of people. It became possible to think about the public being convinced to donate to these kinds of horrors that were happening very far away from them, often in countries where they didn't know much about the culture or detailed politics.

And there isn't actually anything deeply wrong with not knowing the details of the culture or politics of s county thousands of miles away on another continent. Often people in places like that have very stereotyped, television based ideas about places like the UK too. (And people in other places do get mixed up about the size and make up of other continents too, you have no idea how often Canadians get told they must be Americans.)

But there was a very steep learning curve in terms of the need to respond in a careful way to the real political situation, the perils of giving money to corrupt regimes, and so on. And actually - some of this was known by governments who had been working internationally for decades even centuries, and it accounted in some cases for their hesitation to act in these kinds of situations, or the roundabout ways they did act. But for the new NGOs that were emerging, they made a lot of errors in those early days of operating.

There was also a lot of change in the way situations were presented, the tendency back in the early 80s was to show the most horrible images and beg people to send money, and that created certain perceptions about the places where thee problems were going on. The idea was to show the worst and make people feel compelled to give. The fact is, when you say there is an ongoing civil war, and has been for decades, and corruption is responsible for a lot of the problems, people don't open their pocketbooks to the same degree. So there was something of a tendency to simplify the situation.

I actually don't think it's a great song - it reminds me a bit of Imagine, which is just really self-indulgent and naive with this idea that nice feelings will fix human nature. But in the case of DTKIC I think it's just much more simple, with a real attempt to get people to help others in need in a concrete way.

Yeah, the 24 Hour Famine. It was huge in schools, they would have an all night event sometimes where kids came with their pajamas on.

Schools often had Amnesty International letter writing groups then too, with 12 and 12 year ild kids dutifully writing letters to leaders of far off countries about political freedoms and free speech.

I don't think I was "highly unusal" in not liking the song or its lyrics. We weren't clones back in the 80s; there were different opinions on many things, just as there are now. If I could quote X or Facebook from back then, I'm sure I'd find you some.

@43ontherocksporfavor

@DuesToTheDirt everybody I knew bought it!

It's great that it made so much money for charity, but it wasn't for me.

It didn't raise nearly as much money but I loved the Hear'n'Aid charity song Starz.

Tbh the only lyrics in the song that ever really struck me as being a bit odd/stupid was the title itself - Do they know it's Christmas?

I imagine that since the majority of Africans don't celebrate Christmas that regardless of whether they know about it or not they're hardly likely to give a shit 😂

What on earth makes you think the majority of Africans don’t celebrate Christmas? Almost half the population is Christian and there are public holidays in the majority of countries in Africa.

I imagine that since the majority of Africans don't celebrate Christmas that regardless of whether they know about it or not they're hardly likely to give a shit

A huge number of African people are practising Christians. It's the dominant religion in many African countries.

If the lyric is silly, that's the reason! But like most of it, it wasn't supposed to be taken completely literally.

Tonight thank god it’s them instead of you a line written about his children. Bono refused to sing it and Bob geldof told him, it’s not about you imagine your children and then bono sang it.

It also doesn’t snow in Africa at Christmas. It’s summer time in the southern hemisphere. Bob used to live on my street in London!

Bob is an amazing human being and his heart was and is firmly in the right place.
He chose to raise Tiger Lilly with his own daughters after Paula Yates’ death. What a man!

Fucking hell. Go look at a map.

Of its time. Good, in its day, but a bit naff now.

This song was written specifically to raise money for famine stricken Ethiopia in the '80's, when the lyrics were appropriate.

Oh Fu*k off 🙄. The song is almost 40 years old! The lyrics are telling you to be grateful for what you’ve got because there are people out there dying because they have nothing

I'm thanking the god I don't believe in that i've not heard this bloody song this year !

Or Slade and Wham either

I was a teenager when it first came out, I very socially naive teen and even I questioned the lyrics.
As an aside, does anyone else remember knitting those jumpers for Blue Peter to send to Ethiopia at around the same time. Between us we must of made hundreds in Home Ec. At school

That song has apparently raised more than £200million to fight famine in Africa since its release in 1984. Bob Geldof helped people when the rest of the world were just wringing their hands. What has OP done that compares to that? I mean other than carping on about word choices made nearly 40 years ago?