In last week's class we watched Eminem's video for his song Stan. It is about a crazed fan who wants to be "just like" Eminem by way of his songs and videos. What he doesn't know is that Eminem is not truly himself in these songs but uses them as an artistic outlet to get his emotions out. In the end Stan kills himself and his pregnant girlfriend out of outrage that Eminem would not get back to his letters.
With this song and video Eminem wanted to show the critics how he felt about people taking his work in a literal sense and thinking he was a violent person. He claims that any songs that have violent references either about wishing to kill his ex-wife, his mother or inflicting harm on anyone else are created so he can take his anger out through a creative medium while not actually doing anything illegal and harmful.
While I think getting out your feelings and not harboring them inside of you is a good idea, the way he has done this may not be the best. When someone is famous and therefore in the public eye with many fans regardless of how they mean certain things they say or do their fans will take much of it to a literal sense. Surely Britney Spears did not wear schoolgirl outfits in her daily life yet many girls adopted the look because she wore it in a video. The same thing can go for Eminem's lyrics. In reality he may not want to hurt his ex-wife or mother and is only expressing the anger and pain they have caused him yet while listening to these songs they can strike emotions in people and their messages can unintentionally persuade fans to change the way they think.
While Eminem nor any other celebrity is directly responsible for what their beliefs and emotions are, especially if they are not trying to get other people to act upon them they must come to the realization that some people take things to heart and much too seriously. Messages artists have can get misinterpreted and misconstrued by others and therefore it would be the most obvious thing to look to the creators of them for blame.
I believe that artists such as Eminem who want to channel their emotions through their art should be able to do so yet since people are easily influenced and if the artists themselves do not want to undergo the inevitable blame others will place on them, certain songs or works should be created only for themselves. In this way the process of creating such works can still be therapeutic yet no one will take it the wrong way and act upon any illegal actions.
Hey Jackie, I posted my response over at my blog: http://jcandpc.blogspot.com/2011/03/response-to-jackie-artists-beware-fans.html
ReplyDeleteJackie, I agree with most, but not all of what you’re saying. I do agree that artists such as Eminem cannot help how people interpret his music however I do not think it is fair to say that his music should be created for himself (and kept from the masses) to serve a therapeutic purpose.
ReplyDeleteThe music industry is a business, a big business in which the job of artists such as Eminem is to sell albums. If all stars were cautious to keep certain music to themselves, they would not be musicians but more like an unpublished poet. An artist cannot be concerned with what will fit in well with the main stream audience, because if that was the case 1) music genres and styles would be far more basic and 2) the music industry would not be as grand as it is. The music industry is about being distinguished from the previous Joe/Jane Smith in order to develop your own fan base and create momentum and competition and ambition for coming up artists.
I think the quote “All attention is good attention” is fundamental to the music industry and encourage the radical lyrics of artists such as Eminem. He does have the right to express himself, as do you, as do I. Likewise, we have the right to comment and criticize what he considers “Art” or “Therapeutic”. Just because my thoughts may only reach 10 people, and his might reach 10 million does not make him obligated to skew/edit/proofread/ or sugar coat his feelings to suit the needs of all 10 million. He did not sign up to be a life coach, the president, the ideal citizen, or a priest. He signed up to write music that may or may not reflect his life experiences, and hope to get a reaction from fans who will continually wish to listen to more.
So although I definitely agree with you that people like Eminem have a great influence over their audiences who may misinterpret what they are putting out there and as a result act out in violence. However, I think that if we are going to put the onus on Eminem to keep his music that may be deemed violent/inappropriate to himself as a therapeutic measure, then we also have to apply this same obligation to movie makers, book writers, television show creators, bloggers (the list goes on) who also extend violent imagery/narrative to a widespread audiences.
Jackie,
ReplyDeleteI agree with you 100%. Those who are in the spotlight have such a huge impact on our society and especially our youth. They shouldn’t be expressing messages of hate or crime to the general public, because just like “Stan” not everyone is in the right state of mind, and are able to not take music like this seriously.
I’d also like to point out that children are like sponges which soak up all that is thrown at them. Where do you think children get the idea to commit crime? They clearly don’t come up with these schemes themselves, because if they were never exposed to criminal actions in the first place they wouldn’t have any sort of idea of how to carry them out. Instead, when they hear songs that discuss murder, and “raping a bitch” it all of a sudden becomes “cool”. “If Eminem’s doing it, it can’t be that bad”. Like I said before, children are like sponges and are completely gullible and naive, because let’s face it they don’t know any better. As an adult or parent it is our responsibility to instill the right messages upon our children, to teach them the differences between right and wrong. Yet at the same time that is so difficult when Eminem the “cool pop star” is suggesting otherwise.
Also, others have commented that they believe Eminem DOES have the right to sing about whatever he wants, considering it is an outlet for him, not to mention that he has the right to freedom of speech. And you are right he does have that right to sing about whatever he wants, but that doesn’t make it MORALLY RIGHT. Should we start singing about raping elders too? Or how about kidnapping and dismembering young children? Because I mean we have the right to sing about anything we want, as long as were not doing it… right?
Just because we have the “ legal” right to do something, doesn’t make it morally right. So yes, although Eminem does have the legal right to sing about anything he wants doesn’t mean it is the right thing to do, nor the right messages to distribute to our youth. And who am I to say what the “ right” message is? Someone who doesn’t support the rape or the demeaning of women, in which Eminem, or sorry, should I say “slim shady” acts out in his songs ( kill you – Eminem).
Bieber to the end.
Cheers.