Music Doesn't Make A Person

When the Columbine Massacre occurred, there was a lot of speculation about what influenced the two teenage killers, Eric Harris (18 ) and Dylan Klebold (17), to go on a rampage. The media focused around Marilyn Manson, Rammstein and the ‘dark’ music scene in general. When I found out about this, I decided I would do a kind of investigation on it. There are a lot of people that believe that music, among other things, influences teenagers to be violent, have sex, be suicidal and do drugs. This article is completely from a teenager’s point of view.

There are a lot of different genres of music; all of them have teenage listeners, whether it’s classical music, or heavy metal. Tons of controversy surrounds the ‘emo’ music scene. The media believes that this genre of music can influence teenagers to self harm. I’ve spoken to some of the teenagers that listen to ‘emo’ music, and they say that the music makes them happier and it brings them out of lows, so I ask, how something that makes a person happier can, make them suicidal also?

I researched the reasons behind the rumour, the reasons I found were mainly about the lyrics, even though some of them are taken out of proportion. For example, one of the main ‘emo’ bands is Dashboard Confessional; some of the lyrics are “If you can’t leave it be, might as well make it bleed”. Another one of the ‘emo’ bands, which are highly accused of promoting suicide, is My Chemical Romance; although this band is very against it. In the chorus of ‘Famous Last Words’, there is a line that is repeated, saying “I am not afraid to keep on living, I am not afraid to walk this world alone...” But they are still accused of promoting suicide.

A lot of people think that hip/hop; R ‘n’ B, Rap and Heavy Metal are the main causes of violence and sex in teens. Some rappers rap about guns, shooting and sex. A very famous rapper, 50 cent has a song called Gun Runners, some of its lyrics are as follows; “And a little more common, 9 millimetre Ruger, 16 shots, hollow point will go through ya, and this? This here? This is a 12 gauge mossburg kid…” That song talks about guns, but nowhere does it say, “Go buy this gun, or that gun”. A song that promotes sex is “Ayo Technology” by Timbaland, Justin Timberlake and 50 cent. This lyric in this song is; “she’s so much more than you're used to, she knows just how to seduce you, she gone do the right thing and touch the right spot”. This part of the song is about a girl giving a lap dance. A lot of the teenage girls that I know, like this song. Though, the girls that I know don’t give lap dances and do not agree with the ‘sexual’ parts of this song, they just like the singing and the beat.

I honestly do not think that a song can make a person act a certain way whether its harming someone else or themselves, whether it being sexually or physically. Music taste is a fairly big part of a personality, but people aren’t going to listen to music that makes them suicidal, or angry. A person who does listen to music to make themselves angry or suicidal, in my opinion, has a lot more problems than just bad music taste.

A lot of the bullying problems in schools and community are because of the media. The ‘emo’ teens are seen as suicidal because of the media implying that the music they listen to influences it, but a lot of them are quite happy. The ones that are called ‘S**ts’ don’t always sleep around, but because of the music they listen to, they are accused of it. Personally, I think the media need to look deeper than just a music taste.

As you can see in this article, music isn’t all that shapes a person.