Sometimes I scare myself...

As the title of this entry states, sometimes I scare myself...

I've been working on a bit of a project for my Girl Scouts and it entails my going through their list of musical preferences... Now this was a learning experience over all for me just because as far as music goes I've pretty stayed out of touch for the last 10 or so years just because most of the music I heard on the radio made me sick... Bad wonna-be Rap, Hip Hop etc... I couldn't take it...

But then I actually let my Slacker play one day and found that I liked a lot of the stuff that's come out in the last year or so... (I'll admit it was mostly because many of my favorite artists from the 90s had made incredible come backs... but I digress) So I decided I wanted to learn more...


I put out a 2 purpose request to my Girl Scouts... 1st purpose I have to keep a bit under wraps because it entails a bit of a surprise for them (though not the grand one I planned but you'll find out about that later) and 2nd was to learn what the heck people are listening to these days because I'd found myself out of touch with music and that sucked because I'm like a freaking human juke box and having nothing new in my memory banks just pissed me off and there's no better way to get a glimpse than to ask 12 year olds...

I started this endeavor by asking these 4 12 year olds to make me a list of their 20 favorite songs... Then, once I'd seen their lists, I started listening to the 'pop'ular stations that would be most likely to play these songs.

I discovered two things... as I said before, music had made a bit of turn back in a direction I could tolerate... and the other thing I learned is that it had also gotten worse... I also discovered artists that I'd once dismissed (Katy Perry being one of them) because their music had progressed into something better since the first time I'd heard it... and I rediscovered many of my favorites (Gotta love reconnecting with my love for P!NK and Eminem)

So now with a firmer grasp of these songs that they had put on their lists I sat down to wade through their lists... and I realized that I couldn't use many of the songs because if they weren't out right labelled Explicit, I knew from having heard them that they were questionable and I couldn't include them in my little project...

And this is the point where I scare myself...

Two things dawned on me...

I actually stopped and thought about the content of these songs like a *gulp* responsible adult. (OH NO! PLEASE SAY IT AIN'T SO!) Before I wouldn't have cared if they had questionable content or swears in them... I wouldn't have thought twice about including them... but last night I found myself thinking that yes, one girl may be allowed to listen to this sort of music, others may not be and I could get into a bit of deep crap if these songs got into the hands of a girl who had the disapproving parents...

But this also led to me to another realization that made me a bit sick inside... I was 'censoring' the content of my project because of its content... I'm a purist when it comes to music... I don't like that people censor out swears and the like in a song because the song was created with these words and they are an expression of the artist singing them and the people that wrote them... who am I to say this is right or wrong? Who am I to judge like this? I felt like such a hypocrite... I don't like feeling this way... not one bit...

But because of this I found that I couldn't do the project as had originally intended because of this... and the fact that there was way too much over-lap in their lists. Over-lap being an issue I can handle... I just don't like the other stuff was a reason too... but being in the position I'm in I don't have a choice... I can't put questionable content into my Girl Scout's hands...

I hate this growing up shit... I really do...

V.