analyze the lyrics of "Do they know it's Christmas" here

no one's criticizing the concept or the effort. just the words of the song. charity good. crappy writing bad. that's all.

masked gazza 110 percent OTM about oasis.

I disagree 100%. If the song's irrelevant then they shouldn't have written and recorded a song, they should have just done a series of PSAs asking people to donate money. Instead, they created a work of art, which at the end of the day -- since people have spent money on it -- must live and die by its own artistic achievements.

I happen to like the song loads -- I'm capable of shutting out silly lyrics when I need to -- but am enjoying these analyses immensely.

to be fair to palomino's argument, which i otherwise disagree with, he's not saying the song is irrelevant. he's saying the quality of the song is irrelevant. if they just did a series of PSAs, it seems likely they would have made a lot less money for the cause than they made with the song.

I'm honestly not grasping the difference. Why write a new song if quality is irrelevant? They could have just recorded "Happy Birthday" or "Jingle Bells" and saved themselves a lot of time. But they didn't, which I should think means quality counts for something.

both songs had pretty huge shortcomings, too, but their very existence certainly did make a difference.

You're a good fucking time, Palomino.

This is what I thought too, but I looked it up on a factbook site and lo and behold, 50-55% are Muslim! So much for the "great Christian Kingdom"

So that's what Cindy Lauper was screaming.....

What about over-educated hipster dickheads facilely criticising the invasion of Iraq? I mean, at least Bush & Co. are devoting their energies to improving the chances of survival of some of the most unfortunate people in the world. By bombing them, mostly.

What about over-educated hipster dickheads facilely criticising the Catholic Church? I mean, at least John Paul II & Co. are devoting their energies to improving the chances of survival of some of the most unfortunate people in the world. By making sure there's lots more of them to go around.

At what point does one become over-educated? I want to know when to stop reading books and start burning them.

Sorry for having a different opinion.

Possibly David Brooks!

You didn't notice the vaguest hint of irony in what I posted?

Morals are the new irony, dude.

I was just pissed off with the "charity can never be criticised" bollocks I quoted at the beginning.

thats actually approx. the christian population, muslim is abt 48 with abt 2% animist (margins of error on both which is why it does not add up)

the history of ethiopia's ruling classes has been predominantly christian tho, which is where that "christian kingdom" comes from. but prob. the longest and best example of peaceful coexistence between the two faiths

(snip)

Which, in turn, is a Nobel prize candidate when compared to this work by the same author:

There's A Place In
Your Heart
And I Know That It Is Love
And This Place Could
Be Much
Brighter Than Tomorrow
And If You Really Try
You'll Find There's No Need
To Cry
In This Place You'll Feel
There's No Hurt Or Sorrow

There Are Ways
To Get There
If You Care Enough
For The Living
Make A Little Space
Make A Better Place...

Heal The World
Make It A Better Place
For You And For Me
And The Entire Human Race
There Are People Dying
If You Care Enough
For The Living
Make A Better Place
For You And For Me

If You Want To Know Why
There's A Love That
Cannot Lie
Love Is Strong
It Only Cares For
Joyful Giving
If We Try
We Shall See
In This Bliss
We Cannot Feel
Fear Or Dread
We Stop Existing And
Start Living

Then It Feels That Always
Love's Enough For
Us Growing
So Make A Better World
Make A Better World...

Heal The World
Make It A Better Place
For You And For Me
And The Entire Human Race
There Are People Dying
If You Care Enough
For The Living
Make A Better Place
For You And For Me

And The Dream We Were
Conceived In
Will Reveal A Joyful Face
And The World We
Once Believed In
Will Shine Again In Grace
Then Why Do We Keep
Strangling Life
Wound This Earth
Crucify Its Soul
Though It's Plain To See
This World Is Heavenly
Be God's Glow

We Could Fly So High
Let Our Spirits Never Die
In My Heart
I Feel You Are All
My Brothers
Create A World With
No Fear
Together We'll Cry
Happy Tears
See The Nations Turn
Their Swords
Into Plowshares

We Could Really Get There
If You Cared Enough
For The Living
Make A Little Space
To Make A Better Place...

Heal The World
Make It A Better Place
For You And For Me
And The Entire Human Race
There Are People Dying
If You Care Enough
For The Living
Make A Better Place
For You And For Me

Heal The World
Make It A Better Place
For You And For Me
And The Entire Human Race
There Are People Dying
If You Care Enough
For The Living
Make A Better Place
For You And For Me

Heal The World
Make It A Better Place
For You And For Me
And The Entire Human Race
There Are People Dying
If You Care Enough
For The Living
Make A Better Place
For You And For Me

There Are People Dying
If You Care Enough
For The Living
Make A Better Place
For You And For Me

There Are People Dying
If You Care Enough
For The Living
Make A Better Place
For You And For Me

You And For Me
You And For Me
You And For Me
You And For Me
You And For Me
You And For Me
You And For Me
You And For Me
You And For Me
You And For Me
You And For Me

Wow, with those lyrics laid out with Every Word Capitalized, it looks almost like the next Fiona Apple album title.

I would contend that it's the point at which one applies one's hard-won wealth of knowledge to the pursuit of shooting fish in a barrel.

The Voltaire Medal for Even-Handedness goes to Fact Checking Cuz for his defense of a viewpoint that he doesn't agree with.

Finally, I would like to point out that it's entirely unfair to conflate a defense of Band Aid with support for Neo-Con ideology or Catholic ideology.

I don't mind if you go
I don't mind if you take it slow
I don't mind if you say yes or no
I don't mind at all

I don't care if you live or die
Couldn't care less if you laugh or cry
I don't mind if you crash or fly
I don't mind at all

I don't mind if you come or go
I don't mind if you say no
Couldn't care less baby let it flow
'Cause I don't care at all

Na na na, etc.

I don't care ify ou sink or swim
Lock me out or let me in
Where I'm going or where I've been
I don't mind at all

I don't mind if the government falls
Implements more futile laws
I don't care if the nation stalls
And I don't care at all

I don't care if they tear down trees
I don't feel the hotter breeze
Sink in dust in dying sees
And I don't care at all

Na na na etc.

I don't mind if culture crumbles
I don't mind if religion stumbles
I can't hear the speakers mumble
And I don't mind at all

I don't care if the Third World fries
It's hotter there I'm not surprised
Baby I can watch whole nations die
And I don't care at all

I don't mind I don't mind I don't mind I don't mind
I don't mind I don't mind
I don't mind at all

Na na na etc.

I don't mind about people's fears
Authority no longer hears
Send a social engineer
And I don't mind at all

i DO try to be even-handed -- i'm a libra -- but i can't accept this award because i have no idea what you're talking about. i defended your assertion that the quality of the song isn't relevant to the cause of helping poor people in africa, because i do in fact agree with that assertion. i disagree with, and did not defend, your assertion that it's therefore morally wrong to even discuss the quality of the song and doing so makes us a bunch of dickheads who are simultaneously too smart ("over-educated") and too dumb ("facile").

one of the nice things about living in a democratic nation is that we're free to pick and choose who and what we agree with, and we even have the right to agree with certain people some of the time and disagree with them some of the time. or at least i think we still are; i haven't checked with my democratically elected leader lately.

I loved how they just couldn't resist the close up video shot of Sting during this line.

^^Came here to post exactly that--the Sting name-dropping in the middle of this song.

Holiday radio would be a lot more fun if DJs would play the 12" version.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pnKiT1aaxSQ

I love it when Bowie totally Debbie Downers the whole party.

the snow part gets me because While several mountain ranges in North Africa see snowfall on a regular basis it is very rare for snow to settle at lower altitudes, especially on the savannahs. ... Nonetheless, snow on the plains, anywhere on the African continent, remains incredibly rare.

Australia doesn't get a white Christmas too often either but they didn't get a song

Well they didn't have a famine did they