There's a Czech hip-hop song making the rounds called "Hej ty kundo v bílim dome" (hey, you cunt in the White House). A few kids in my son's class have the song downloaded to their mobile phones and play it incessantly, it is ever so cool, combining a disrespect for authority, a hatred for another country's leader, and a great dance beat that you can dance to!
So my ten-year-old son asked if he could have a copy of this CD that the kids in his class were listening to, whereupon I learned the lyrics, whereupon I was rather upset.
In nine verses, President Bush is called both Czech words for a cunt ten times, a dick four times, and a various variations of a fucker eight times. Other nouns include shithead, fart, purple scab, and ass ulcer. At the end the author expresses his desire to kick his jaw and trample his mug.
This upsets me on several levels. I am trying to break it down:
1. I don't think it is appropriate for children to own music with this amount of foul language. I wouldn't have it regulated any more than I would regulate children's clothing or most other child/parent choices short of child abuse, but there's no way my kid is getting this stuff and I'm a little shocked that multiple kids in the class know and own this song.
2. I don't think it's appropriate under most circumstances to criticize another country's government, unless:
2a. You are doing so primarily in terms of how that government's policies affect your own;
2a1. Or if you feel that government's policies are negatively affecting other countries, or if you feel that the country's own inhabitants are being harmed, but you'd better be really, really ready to defend your position;
2b. You are aware of the basic political structure of the country whose government you are criticizing;
2c. You are politically active in your own country. For the purposes of argument, I will call "voting" politically active. For the purposes of children, I will say: "Parents who vote" and/or the ability to correctly name the top three figures in your government.
3. Although I certainly dislike George Bush as a President, and I don't think he's doing any honor to the post, I do think it is an honorable post. It is like a bad teacher: you can hate the individual but the job title still deserves respect.
I don't know, I'm kind of horrified. Maybe I'm turning out to be more conservative than I thought I was, but I really... it hurts me that ten-year-olds hear this stuff about any world leader. I mean, I grew up on Joan Baez and Peter, Paul and Mary and could sing Le Deserteur before I knew it was in French; I went to high school starry-eyed with "Free Nelson Mandela" and "Feed the World" (ridiculous, as if I understood the first thing about apartheid & as if the harshest thing that could happen was the lack of snow in Africa). I'm not saying I was better informed than these kids are. But I think there's a fundamental difference between an uninformed romanticism of protest and a directed criticism of a country's leader, and I think that Bono, no matter how horrifically orange his glasses, kicks this Czech hiphop boy to the curb in terms of moral integrity. And I feel frankly tempted to call these kids' parents and tell them what I really think of Mr. Klaus, set in verse, with maximum cursing. Except I have too much respect to do so. Sigh.