A Song Against Songs… A Counter-Strike to Pop Culture Manipulation:
If you only have 3 minutes today, listen to this song and consider what it means to you. If you have 5 minutes – listen to the song, and then read on.
It’s not about the song – or even ‘their’ message – it’s about the message behind the message, which is both abundantly clear and logical… IF ‘we think’ about it.
If your goal was to “rule the modern world” — how would you go about it?
In age of globalization and technology enables near real-time communication across the masses — if you’re goal was to rule the world, how would you do so?
Do you believe that “empires” do not exist today? Do you believe that at some point, folks “in control” stopped caring about securing MORE CONTROL?
While technological advancements ‘appear’ to have fundamentally changed the world around us — it merely changes how we ‘execute’ certain things, but it does NOT fundamentally change what motivates us — what drives us as human beings.
Empires still exist. And behind EVERY empire, there is a desire to expand it. Whether in politics or in business, it is a natural inclination — it is human. The goals have not changed — but what HAS changed is how ‘borders’ are defined, and how empires expand.
How would you Expand an Empire?
Conquering another country via “brute force” just does not fly these days, in the traditional sense. As much ‘bad’ as there in the world today, there is still something within most of us, which makes up the overwhelming majority — which DOES PREFER RIGHT OVER WRONG.
We are not perfect all the time, perhaps we are not even ‘good’ most of the time. But at the core, we want the world to be better — and if anything, hope that our ‘leaders’ are more altruistic than we are on a day-to-day basis.
To expand and maintain an empire, while ‘brute force’ may have been efficient back in the day — the most effective plan is by ‘training the minds you’re leading to put value in the things within your control as a leader’… as a royal.
GET THE MESSAGE: MONEY, DRUGS, VIOLENCE IN POP-CULTURE
Empires are being expanded, and controlled, TODAY – far beyond the boundaries of those we learned about in History class. The technology is in place to grow them bigger than the Ming Dynasty and faster than the Roman Empire… and the systems are in place to maintain them.
The “ruling class” does so today through age-old tactics which are more effective than ever — a tactic well studied and executed by one of the cruelest and ‘brute force’ examples, in Nazi Germany…. SOCIAL MANIPULATION.
The TV shows we watch…. The songs we listen to — over, and over, and OVER again. They shape the minds of the populous, slowly, but exponentially, and ever so surely. The minds of those ruled are shaped to align in favor of those ruling. If we are exposed to “money, money, money” on a consistent basis – eventually even the most humble of us will be hard-pressed to NOT have ‘money on our minds’… That is not ‘conspiracy theory’, my friends, that is frickin’ logic!!!
And yes, even those of us acutely aware of this tactic for mass-control, are at risk. In fact, those of us “truly” aware of it, understand that there is no reason to “fear” — it is, again, a logical means to an age old end. This does not mean we need to avoid all ‘pop-culture’ songs which do not have a positive message — and it does not mean we cannot enjoy a particular show which is somewhat violent — it just means that we SHOULD be aware, and remember “all things in moderation”….
So how did a mere song in pop-culture today pique my interest? BECAUSE, using the same medium used to shape our minds — this song “Royals” STRIKES BACK with a different message.
“Royals” by Lordes: THE MESSAGE BEHIND THE MESSAGE
This song is a strong counter to the steady stream of “money, drugs, & violence” we are exposed to today.
If one were set to the rule the world, cough, royals, it would be logical to shape the minds of those you’re ruling via pop-culture. After all, if one controlled the ‘financial system’, they’d like to increase the value of it – and the best way to increase the value of a dollar is to increase our love of money.
All things in moderation – but if you’re going to listen to one song on “repeat” for a minute – choose wisely — because no matter how strong willed you are, or how cognatively disciplined you are — all things in our environment eventually “get through to us”, and once it gets through, it eventually shapes who we are today and who we will be in the future!
Song “Royals” by Lorde – The Meaning’s Above, the Lyrics are Below
[Verse 1]
I’ve never seen a diamond in the flesh
I cut my teeth on wedding rings in the movies
And I’m not proud of my address,
In a torn-up town, no postcode envy
But every song’s like gold teeth, grey goose, trippin’ in the bathroom
Blood stains, ball gowns, trashin’ the hotel room,
We don’t care, we’re driving Cadillacs in our dreams.
But everybody’s like Cristal, Maybach, diamonds on your timepiece.
Jet planes, islands, tigers on a gold leash.
We don’t care, we aren’t caught up in your love affair.
And we’ll never be royals (royals).
It don’t run in our blood,
That kind of luxe just ain’t for us.
We crave a different kind of buzz.
Let me be your ruler (ruler),
You can call me queen Bee
And baby I’ll rule, I’ll rule, I’ll rule, I’ll rule.
Let me live that fantasy.
[Verse 2]
My friends and I—we’ve cracked the code.
We count our dollars on the train to the party.
And everyone who knows us knows that we’re fine with this,
We didn’t come for money.
But every song’s like gold teeth, grey goose, trippin’ in the bathroom.
Blood stains, ball gowns, trashin’ the hotel room,
We don’t care, we’re driving Cadillacs in our dreams.
But everybody’s like Cristal, Maybach, diamonds on your timepiece.
Jet planes, islands, tigers on a gold leash
We don’t care, we aren’t caught up in your love affair
And we’ll never be royals (royals).
It don’t run in our blood
That kind of luxe just ain’t for us.
We crave a different kind of buzz.
Let me be your ruler (ruler),
You can call me queen Bee
And baby I’ll rule, I’ll rule, I’ll rule, I’ll rule.
Let me live that fantasy.
Ooh ooh oh
We’re bigger than we ever dreamed,
And I’m in love with being queen.
Ooh ooh oh
Life is great without a care
We aren’t caught up in your love affair.
And we’ll never be royals (royals).
It don’t run in our blood
That kind of luxe just ain’t for us.
We crave a different kind of buzz
Let me be your ruler (ruler),
You can call me queen Bee
And baby I’ll rule, I’ll rule, I’ll rule, I’ll rule.
Let me live that fantasy.