Back in my day...

Katy Perry's Dark Horse is... quite the video. We're in Egypt, Katy is on a gold throne with some dancers dressed as Egyptian Hieroglyphs (having cat masks on). They dance in a jerky fashion, and then we're taken to Katy's palace. It looks like the typical Egyptian palace, except everything is red, blue, and pink. A guy dressed as what I would describe as an Egyptian pimp steps forward, gives Katy a huge diamond, and she melts him into sand. Then she is presented with a pyramid of Twinkies, and some Cheetos.

We see the same type of logic in the video for Turn Down for What, by lil Jon and Snake. The video begins with a man in pajamas dancing, and then he dances and breaks through the ceiling of the building he is on, and startles the women in the apartment that he has just fallen into. She calls the police, and we see the officer's face melt off. The women then dances too, and they fall though the floor, get the people in that apartment to dance, and the trend continues.

I am slowly losing faith in humanity. Once upon a time, videos meant something, or at least the lyrics did. For example, the first music video shown on MTV was Video Killed the Radio Star, by the Buggles. Though this video doesn’t really back the meaning of the song (that new things are putting traditional things out of style, making life hard for some people), it still doesn’t involve vulgar dancing or simply inaccurate and stupid things that are being shown to children as “hip”. Maybe I’m just old fashioned, but in my opinion Dark Horse and Turn Down For What are complete wastes of natural resources.

That being said, just because a video doesn’t back the songs meaning doesn’t mean it’s tasteless. For example, Michael Jackson’s Thriller. The video goes with the song, and entertains quite well. Now on the other hand, Smooth Criminal has good and modest dancing. Videos can be really great, if they’re not vulgar and sexualized how today’s videos are. These videos, this media, is what children are seeing and wanting to grow up to be. I wouldn’t want my CAT dancing the way the man was in Turn Down For What, and this is what our children are watching and impersonating. What kind of message does that convey? This is what is happening to our media, and yet people still ask questions about why teen pregnancy rates are going up. 

Dark Horse:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KSOMA3QBU0

Turn Down For What
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMUDVMiITOU

Video Killed the Radio Star
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iwuy4hHO3YQ&feature=kp

Thriller
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOnqjkJTMaA

Smooth Criminal
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_D3VFfhvs4