MUSIC affecting us as a society?

i wanted to hear some opinions about this:

Can music raise questions about society's norms and values?

Examples?

I was thinking... who wouldn't question music w/ all its encouragement of violence, sex, and drugs? Although to some, this music may be a bit extreme, the music actually reflects our society. Our rising obsessions with money (materialism), sex, and drugs are all reflected in music. It has become normal for people to have premarital sex, to drink and party everyday, and to do drugs like cocaine, especially because the music constantly exposes us to it, which makes us think it's alright for us to do it. It very much sickens me. What is society heading for? O, Brave New World.... It scares me to think about the next 50 years because i know it'll be much worse.

MUSIC affecting us as a society?

-(Myspace music www.myspace.com)

Well, I'm not sure where to begin but you bring up a good question. In terms of music reflecting society, I think it goes both ways. The music that promotes violence is so popular that society reflects IT. it's kind of like they both make each other worse- the more violent society is, the more the music is about it. And the more the music is about it, the more people are influenced into thinking that that is the way they should behave.

However, I don't like to go all-out saying that the violent music is bad. because, violent though it may be, not everyone is influenced by it. People have been watching violent movies for decades and listening to violent music since the late 1980's and most people know how to separate "cool" violence in a movie or song from reality without a problem. But some people apparently do not. So basically, I guess what I'm saying is that I am against criticising the music for being violent because I think people should know better than to take the lyrics as instructions for real life. To be honest, I like a lot of rap music that talks explicitly about killing and stealing... but I know that there is a giant line between a "cool" song that makes killing seem cool and actually doing it in real life. I mean, come on!

As for society being bad and where it's going: I would point out that society has ALWAYS been full of badness and that it is an illusion to think that the present is any worse than the past. People have ALWAYS been having premarital sex (which I dont even think is a bad thing at all), murder has ALWAYS been very very very common. And drug use has also been very very very common since the dawn of man. People like to get intoxicated, they like to have sex, and they frequently kill eachother over small matters. Thats humans for ya. What are you gonna do?

MUSIC affecting us as a society?

-(Myspace.com graphics myspace.com)

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