What Are Our Children Listening To?

by Amy Goodwin on January 26, 2012

A few weeks ago I was whistling the tune Pumped Up Kicks by Foster the People, and one of the students asked me, “Mrs. Goodwin, Did you know that song is about a boy going on a shooting spree?”

“What? No way!” I raced over to my computer and looked up the lyrics and sure enough he was right.

All the other kids with the pumped up kicks better run better run outrun my gun.
All the other kids with the pumped up kicks better run better run faster than my bullet.

I couldn’t believe I’d been singing that. How is it that mainstream pop radio stations play this song at least ten times day?

Besides being appalled, I also felt like a real chump. Truth was the singer did nothing to disturb my expectation of pop music. The song is happy and upbeat; it’s a catchy tune. I didn’t bother to learn the words. I just whistled along. The reality was the subject matter of the song’s lyrics weren’t important to me. It was all about the feelings projected by the singer’s tone of voice and inflection. Here I thought I was whistling like Snow White (remember the song Whistle While you Work.) What I really was whistling was violent and highly subversive. Which got me thinking…what is the role of music in our children’s lives and should we be worried by what they are listening to?

Back in 2005 I attended a panel called Instruments of Freedom presented by the LBJ School. I liked the panel so much, I got the dvd. The panel consisted of many famous local musicians: Jerry Jeff Walker, Marcia Ball, David Garza, Carolyn Wonderland, Sarah Hickman, Harold McMillan, Tony Scalzo and Kinky Friedman plus several UT professors. They sat around talking about the politics of music. What they said about hip hop still stays with me.

One of the UT professors (a Caucasian) said, “For me, the best music at present in every genre from hard rock to hard core punk is hip hop. Hip hop music doesn’t just legitimate dissenting outrage. It makes it a pleasure.”

Harold McMillan, (an African American musician) piggy backed on the professor’s statement. He said, “This happened a few years ago. I was at a stop light on the drag. And there were some white kids in a jeep next to me. And they were jamming to NWA. (I’m not saying what that stands for—it is highly offensive) These boys from Compton were cursing these white guys out who were listening to them. I’m like do you know what they’re saying to you? And they either didn’t know or didn’t care. Or maybe they wanted to be black kids. I don’t know what the deal was. That was something that always amazed me.”

And Tony Skalzo (a Caucasian and singer of Fastball) responded, “I was literally attracted to the freedom in that music, to the ability to say those things. It’s such a lowest common denominator in a way. There is no other way to put those sentiments. That’s one of my favorite records, Straight out of Compton, and I wasn’t a rap fan at all. I was a young adult, about 24 and it was the first rap that I really went man, this is amazing. It’s not like I wanted to be black, it’s wanting to identify with the realness and that real part of our world and our culture.”

Then Jerry Jeff Walker chuckled and added, “Yeah, and kids have always liked something that makes older people mad.”

And now back to 2012…who the heck is Kid Cudi? I have heard his name on countless occasions. Kids write on his Facebook wall. They quote him. Today I looked up his bio on Wikipedia. Here are some of his hits: Day ‘N’ Night, Mr Rager, Marijuana, Maker Her Say, Soundtrack 2 My Life. Again I felt that sudden moment of shock. This is what 12-year-olds are listening to? I looked at the lyrics to some of these songs and Oh my gosh. I’m not going to repeat them. I’ll let you look for yourself. (At which point you’ll need to open a new tab on your browser and look up urbandictionary.com. You’re going to need it.)

If you have the stomach for it, now watch the music videos. Of course the marijuana song is him walking around smoking marijuana. Interestingly enough in the video Soundtrack 2 My Life, I noticed in most concert footage he is singing to all white teenage audiences. (I think back to the Harold McMillan’s NWA story.) I don’t know what the deal is still. Its very curious.

Are our kids listening to these songs and absorbing these lyrics like toxins? Or are they like me with the Foster the People song, humming along to a cool tune, having no awareness of what the lyrics are actually saying? How worried should we be? Is it worth making effort to examine the lyrics with your child?

Of course it is if you can figure out what they’re listening to and can monitor it. But the music industry is banking on the fact that you can’t keep up. With Iphones, Ipads and downloads, its really hard. Monitoring their music consumption could be a full time job.
If you are fortunate to have the occasion to sit down with them, there are many talking points from which to launch (especially if you also watch the music videos). Hip hop in particular is often devoid of morality. Kids are expressing themselves through every human vice and animal nature. Referring back to Tony Skalzo comment, “It’s a lowest common denominator” phenomenon. Here are some of the questions I might ask:

What attracts you to the music?
What feeling do you get from listening to it?
What do you think the artist is trying to say?
Why is the artist so popular with your generation?

If you don’t have the time to do this, don’t feel guilty. I’m pretty certain if you asked your child to sing you the lyrics of their favorite hip hop songs, they won’t know the lyrics. Or they’ll mess them up. Or they’ll only get a few words right. Or they won’t know what all the words mean. Or they’ll just know the chorus. The panel and my own experience with music have taught me that it’s not as much about the lyrics. If a song has a good rhythm and a catchy tune, we’ll whistle right along.

And again, remember, kids don’t look to musicians for lessons in morality. They look to parents and other trusted adults for lessons in morality. What impresses kids about singers is their ability to say whatever they want to no matter how violent, inappropriate, sexist and racist it is, and there are no teachers or parents there to make them stop. Quite the contrary, some adult has given them a microphone, a captive audience of thousands and millions of dollars to say offensive things. It is quite a remarkable phenomenon if you think about it.

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When Your Daughter Gossips

by Amy Goodwin on January 23, 2012

There’s nothing like kids to make you justify every piece of advice you give. Any stated opinion can raise a multitude of objections. As in the case of discussing gossip and rumors, I can say, “Don’t talk about people. Don’t talk bad about people. Don’t repeat everything you hear” but it is often met with the following questions: “What if what I’m saying is true? What if what I’m telling the person is for their own good? What if I’m trying to help them? What if they need to know so-and-so is BAD NEWS?”

Wading through gossip is part of my job description as a middle school counselor- Helping kids make sense of it; helping them know what to do about it; helping them to stop gossiping when they are doing it themselves. One of the books I’ve found particularly helpful in clarifying the many facets of gossip is Words That Hurt, Words That Heal by Joseph Telushkin.

He refers to three types of gossip in ascending order of seriousness:

Positive Gossip or the spreading of non defamatory truths. Many people believe its okay to talk about someone if what is being said is nice (She is so pretty. Her birthday party was awesome.) Telushkin says positive gossip is a slippery slope and its better not to do it. Why? We never know how another receives our message. What if the listener was not invited to the awesome birthday party? Or what if the listener doesn’t like the girl, and the positive gossip only incites further resentment? Furthermore Telushkin says, its part of human nature to not stay positive for too long. How often does, “She’s so pretty. Her birthday party was awesome” quickly take a negative descent? (“Did you notice she didn’t eat her own birthday cake?” “I’ve noticed she doesn’t eat lunch at school very often”. “I’m worried she might be anorexic.”)

Negative truths or the spreading of bad, but true gossip: We often don’t seem to think there is a problem spreading negative information about someone if that information is TRUE. How often have I heard the phrase. “People need to know…or I’ve got to warn….” Telushkin says we should not spread negative truths, because it lowers another person’s status. He does add the qualifier that on occasion sharing negative truth may be appropriate (He uses examples of giving job references, or when the information might have life-death-significance as in a friend seeing a doctor who you know was convicted of malpractice.) With teens the spreading of negative truth is particularly hard, because everything seems to have life-death significance. A trusted friend betrays another. A boyfriend cheats. “My friend needs to know.” Whether or not to pass on a negative truths bears much discussion. Telushkin strongly emphasizes the question, do they need to know in order to do their job (or go to school) or remain safe? He also references the popularly cited three fold filter. “Is it true? Is it kind? Is it necessary?”

A subdivision of negative truths is tattling, telling others negative comments people have made about them. How many times have I heard girls say, “Did you know she trash talked you? This is what she said…” Again Telushkin says, unless there is a constructive reason…a need to know situation…there is not need to repeat what someone else said. Again teens think it is of life-death significance, so it is helpful to examine the motivation of why the messenger feels the need to tell. Examine what the benefits are of telling. Is it status? Is it because the messenger wants to look like someone in the know? Is it really to protect someone in danger? Will it help them to know? As with the spreading of negative truths, there are exceptions to the rule, but most often the adage “Don’t repeat everything you hear” applies. We do not want to be guilty of lowering another person’s status or perpetuating the destruction of another person’s good name. One of my favorite quotes Telushkin uses in the book is attributed to Mark Twain.

“It takes your enemy and your friend, working together, to hurt you to the heart; the one to slander you and the other to get the news to you.”

Which brings up the third and most serious of all gossip- slander; spreading negative non-truths. “So-and-so said this about you…(when they really didn’t.). So-and-so did this…(when they really didn’t.) It is important to remind kids that in some cultures slander is considered a type of murder. (In fact in our culture we call it character assassination, don’t we?) Since the injuries inflicted by words are intangible, it is easy to minimize the damage they inflict, but we cannot forget that words can be used to inflict devastating and irrevocable suffering on others. Often slander can be very hard to disprove. It can take the truth forever to catch up. Regaining our reputations after slander can be one of the hardest things in life to do.

Most of my examples I’ve given are from the female perspective, probably because I have many more girls than boys in my office complaining about gossip. (Although boys do it too.) Telushkin cites Deborah Tanner’s book You Just Don’t Understand: Women & Men in Conversation. Tanner cites anthropological and sociological research that concludes that teenage girls are more likely to betray friends’ secrets than boys. Why? Boys’ status tends to be based on athletics and how well they physically and verbally prevail in a fight. Girls’ status is linked to their connections. Are they in the “right crowd?” Girls get status by being friends with other high status girls-cheerleaders, pretty girls, girls who are popular with the boys, girls who are “rich”) How do you prove to others that you are friends with the popular girls? You gossip and tell their secrets. In essence you prove yourself by being an unworthy friend.

As your child claws for status in middle school, gossip, spreading rumors, betraying secrets and slander are often the legal tender. It is up to parents and other trusted adults to help them learn otherwise. Therefore we must have our advice on gossip and slander clarified and well articulated. Of course the saying, “What you do speaks so loudly I cannot hear what you are saying” applies. I am by no means innocent of all offenses enumerated in the book. Reading it, reminds me of the awesome power of words.

May we all go longer and longer stretches without saying an unkind word about, or to anyone.

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Alexis Jones-I Am That Girl Revisited

by Amy Goodwin on January 6, 2012

Something happened to Alexis Jones between this year and last year. She honed her I Am That Girl message. She strengthened her impact. While last year’s message was more about how Alexis Jones became a celebrity, this year’s message focused on reprogramming girls’ minds to redefine beauty, stop being mean to one another, forgive, love yourself, create a movement and inspire the next generation.

Sure, my description of her message may sound trite; her presentation was anything but. Jones began by identifying one of the main problems girls face as society’s definition of beauty. By using various media clips like the Dove’s Evolution commercial and Beauty Pressure commercial, Jones tries to raise awareness among teens how “programmed” they are by the pervasive media message that girls just don’t measure up. She questions the media’s standard equation that physical beauty equals a girl’s self worth. She proposes media’s definition of beauty is an illusion that girls can never really achieve.

Through a pie chart, she proposes physical beauty be only one slice in the beauty pie, and that qualities like compassion, passion, honesty, boldness, humility, forgiveness, thoughtfulness, spunk, kindness and courage, share equal slicing. To reinforce the message, she gives the girls a secret assignment, involving videos and interviews. While still in the explanation stages, one teen girl sitting next to me scripted her entire project. The girls loved it!

Another problem Jones identifies for teenage girls is the mean girl phenomenon. She asks the question: Why are girls so mean to each other? Her answer and an easy mantra to remember: Hurt people, hurt people. The premise is that when girls grow up under such impossible standards they cannot meet, they feel insecure and don’t like themselves,so they perpetuate their self doubt and self hatred onto others. It becomes a vicious cycle. She tells the girls it’s not your fault. The problem is cultural and systemic. Showing the music video “Are you Happy Now?” by YouTube sensations Megan and Liz, and a documentary film clip from Finding Kind (“We may not all be beautiful. We may not all be smart. We may not all be talented. But we can all be kind.”) Girls are immersed visually in images of girls hurting and being hurt. They witness the vicious cycle.

Whereas last year’s presentation left me a bit critical and analytical, this year’s presentation left me saying, “I can work with this!” Her message is very much in alignment with my own hopes and counseling goals for teenage girls. It is one I can build upon well after her presentation ends. I took detailed notes, copying down much verbatim. I will try to use her language. Why? Because the girls love her.

I found myself asking, could this message be bottled up and delivered by just anyone? My conclusion is an emphatic no. Given the fact that we have an innate human need to want to idealize someone, and given the fact that our media saturated world has programmed our teen girls to have a narrow standard for those they idealize: thin, glamorous, beautiful, young, energetic, vibrant, confident, funny…celebrities… Alexis meets the teenage girl standard like few can. She has the dazzle to hook them and hold their attention. Her other “pie chart” qualities like spunk, personality, courageousness, passion, boldness, honesty unfold more subtly, which require teenage girls to listen, think abstractly and have a certain level of awareness. Many aren’t there yet.

I asked one of the girls afterwards, “Which presentation did you like better? This year or last year?”
“Last year.” She said. “I liked hearing how she got on Survivor and got famous.”
I sighed. Of course she liked last year. And of course I liked this year.

It may take a while for these 11, 12, 13 & 14-year-olds to grasp the meat of Alexis’s current message. They may have to hear it several times throughout the years. My hope is, as they mature, they will begin to appreciate her ideas of redefining beauty and finding kindness for themselves and others and be less impressed by her beauty and celebrity. So despite the fact middle school girls still want to hear the celebrity stories, I say to Alexis Jones, stay the current course. You delivered a great message swiftly and surely with no missteps, and you kept your celebrity and physical beauty standing sturdy in the background.

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Introducing Parties Austin

by Amy Goodwin on August 7, 2011

This summer I have been working on a new project…Parties Austin. My mission is to create magical decorations for children’s birthday parties. I realized when throwing my own son’s party, the lack of resources available, particularly whimsical lighting and original decorations. After running all over town to Pier 1, Hobby Lobby, Toy Joy, Terra Toys and Wal-Mart, I thought- there’s got to be some way to make this easier for parents.

Our son’s birthday theme was jungle/safari. I bought large plush animals, made a butterfly chandelier, bought strands of lights that looked like daisies. Of course I could have just gone to Party City and bought a prepackaged box of decorations, but that’s not me. As a child I loved being immersed and transported by the legends of pirates, gypsies, fairies, mermaids. I wanted to give my son that same immersive experience. I know. He is only one, and he won’t remember, but I believe in implicit memories. And we had a camera.

Now I didn’t have fancy birthday parties growing up. Mine were very plain and ordinary. My method of magical transportation was through books. My mother read to my brother and I every night.

My favorite book of all time was Hilda Boswell’s Treasury of Poetry which she edited and illustrated. Published by Collins, it was printed in Great Britain. The inscription inside says, “Amy Carlisle Goodwin, Christmas, 1973 From: Grandmother.”

Here is one of the standouts-Firelight by Irene and Aubrey Selincourt:

I like to sit by the fire and stare/At the curious things I can see in there;/It’s better than pictures in a picture book/To sit by the fire and look and look. / I can’t see the things that Anne can see/ (Anne, she’s seven, but I’m just three)/ Faces, and rivers and forests, and all-/(Anne’s enormous, but I’m quite small). /But the fire makes a nice sort of creaky song;/ It popples as if it were running along; /It talks quite soft and it means to say /“I know a nice quiet game to play.”/ I don’t want to jump and I don’t want to shout; /Mummy says, “What are you thinking about?” /But I’m not thinking; I just like to sit quite still by the fire and stare at it.

In addition to the wonderful verse, the illustrations in the book are amazing. The flames have faces. Fairies and castles exist among the coals. A little boy sits on a footstool next to his older sister transfixed by the fire. I can’t tell you how many times I sat in front of the fire hoping to see those same faces. I was always searching for the magic promised to me in books.

After writing and producing a few plays, I can’t help think in terms of set design and staging. I’m no Walt Disney, but I am committed to creating an immersive, authentic, aesthetically pleasing birthday setting…much like the illustrations in Treasury of Poetry come to life. Take a trip to the jungle, dive under the sea with mermaids, sail on the high seas with pirates. Live amongst the fairies.

I am doing my best to bring magic into children’s lives right here in Austin, and if I do the job right, maybe they’ll remember it when they’re forty.

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Alexis Jones-I Am That Girl

February 11, 2011

Alexis Jones paid a school visit this week to talk to our middle school girls and present her program, I am That Girl. Alexis is a graduate of Westlake High School and the University of Southern California where she received a Bachelor’s in International Studies and Spanish and a Master’s in Communication. She achieved fame [...]

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Criminal

February 3, 2011

Yes, I am in education. While I’m very concerned with all the talk of cutting budgets in education, I am also concerned that this education talk is overshadowing another huge issue facing our state. What is a happening to our Texas prison system? Our prisons are already overcrowded, yet the Texas Legislature is proposing a [...]

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Girl Bullying-When Your Daughter Doesn’t Want to Go to School

January 26, 2011

You are walking down the hallway with a friend. Girls say hello to her but not you. You sit down at the lunch table, and everyone mysteriously gets up. You speak to a close friend and she gives you a blank stare. Have you become invisible? Yes, you have. Without even knowing it, you’ve been [...]

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My Father was a Tiger Mother

January 18, 2011

I’d like to respond to the Wall Street Journal article Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior. I love the article, mostly because it’s so provocative. The last time I looked, 6913 people left comments. My father was a Chinese mother. He drove. He challenged. He pitted my brother and I against each other. He shamed and [...]

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