I think there's something a lot of you are missing.
The consensus is this song is talking about people who think they know what the worst part of the world is really like and how to fix it, but really their clueless. And there's an implied "not like me, I'm clued in." there.
You're not.
Okay, there's a small chance you really know what it is to suffer like in a Cambodian labour camp, but since you seem to have internet access and still be alive, the odds are poor.
The mistake here isn't not knowing what it's like in the third world. The mistake is thinking you know.
As for those of you who think this is about how your damned rich, white oppressors wouldn't survive in a place like the Cambodia of the 70s... You'd hardly fare any better.
You can't be hard enough to survive something like that. Something like that can break your body as surely as a bullet and there`s about as much you can do about it.
Disease and starvation kill people. It doesnt matter if you think your a badass because you live in a dirty apartment and your neighbor got shot. It doesnt give you any special kind of protection.
Surviving or dying in a situation like that isn`t even something you can predict. It's like the shipwreck stories where some skinny lil bugger hangs onto a piece of debris all night until someone rescues him while the big, tough guy beside him froze and slipped into the water after only half an hour.
A soft-bodied early twenties college student who's never gone more than twelve hours without eating in their life might survive while someone who's had plenty of bones broken in fights, struggled with drug addiction, and been in and out of jail might die.
And if you think someone needs to be sent to one of those camps just because you find their racial/economic/educational/whatever group distasteful... If you really think that... then you're the fucking monster. You're the person idealists enlist in armies to fight, and you're the monster pulling the strings to create a war for them in the first place.
Excellent post, especially the last paragraph. The song reminds me of that Simpsons episode:
Excellent post, especially the last paragraph. The song reminds me of that Simpsons episode:
Lisa - It's one of those campy 70s throwbacks that appeals to Generation X'ers.
Lisa - It's one of those campy 70s throwbacks that appeals to Generation X'ers.
Bart - We need another Vietnam to thin out their ranks a little.
Bart - We need another Vietnam to thin out their ranks a little.
That line is hilarious. It satirizes some of the more ridiculous justifications for war. This doesn't mean the show writers were pining for another Vietnam. Quite the contrary. The Dead Kennedys are basically saying the same thing. It's fascinating, yet a little depressing, that so many Americans enthusiastically take this at face value.
That line is hilarious. It satirizes some of the more ridiculous justifications for war. This doesn't mean the show writers were pining for another Vietnam. Quite the contrary. The Dead Kennedys are basically saying the same thing. It's fascinating, yet a little depressing, that so many Americans enthusiastically take this at face value.
Sheesh, listen to a little bit of Sly & The Family Stone. It won't make one understand the ghettos. But it's fun. Nothing wrong with that.
@Tamaranis Jello is not saying that he and his clued-in listeners would survive and that the targets of the song would not and should therefore actually be sent there as punishment. The song uses large doses of irony. He is saying that nobody (including himself) raised as a privileged softie American could possibly last 5 minutes in Cambodia, and if they went there on "holiday," they would learn this very quickly. The song makes the statement that his (and my) generation, sometimes called Generation Jones, the cultural generation that came between The Woodstock Generation and Generation X, needs to drop...
@Tamaranis Jello is not saying that he and his clued-in listeners would survive and that the targets of the song would not and should therefore actually be sent there as punishment. The song uses large doses of irony. He is saying that nobody (including himself) raised as a privileged softie American could possibly last 5 minutes in Cambodia, and if they went there on "holiday," they would learn this very quickly. The song makes the statement that his (and my) generation, sometimes called Generation Jones, the cultural generation that came between The Woodstock Generation and Generation X, needs to drop the mindless worship of mass murderers like Chairman Mao and find a political path that actually has a workable endgame. Because Communism, especially as practiced in Asia, had so far led to nightmarish horrors. He's saying wake up, get off your privileged honky ass, and study up on the reality of what it is these stupid hippies have been advocating. A virtual, not actual, holiday in Cambodia, if you will.
I think there's something a lot of you are missing.
The consensus is this song is talking about people who think they know what the worst part of the world is really like and how to fix it, but really their clueless. And there's an implied "not like me, I'm clued in." there.
You're not.
Okay, there's a small chance you really know what it is to suffer like in a Cambodian labour camp, but since you seem to have internet access and still be alive, the odds are poor.
The mistake here isn't not knowing what it's like in the third world. The mistake is thinking you know.
As for those of you who think this is about how your damned rich, white oppressors wouldn't survive in a place like the Cambodia of the 70s... You'd hardly fare any better.
You can't be hard enough to survive something like that. Something like that can break your body as surely as a bullet and there`s about as much you can do about it.
Disease and starvation kill people. It doesn
t matter if you think your a badass because you live in a dirty apartment and your neighbor got shot. It doesnt give you any special kind of protection.Surviving or dying in a situation like that isn`t even something you can predict. It's like the shipwreck stories where some skinny lil bugger hangs onto a piece of debris all night until someone rescues him while the big, tough guy beside him froze and slipped into the water after only half an hour.
A soft-bodied early twenties college student who's never gone more than twelve hours without eating in their life might survive while someone who's had plenty of bones broken in fights, struggled with drug addiction, and been in and out of jail might die.
And if you think someone needs to be sent to one of those camps just because you find their racial/economic/educational/whatever group distasteful... If you really think that... then you're the fucking monster. You're the person idealists enlist in armies to fight, and you're the monster pulling the strings to create a war for them in the first place.
Excellent post, especially the last paragraph. The song reminds me of that Simpsons episode:
Excellent post, especially the last paragraph. The song reminds me of that Simpsons episode:
Lisa - It's one of those campy 70s throwbacks that appeals to Generation X'ers.
Lisa - It's one of those campy 70s throwbacks that appeals to Generation X'ers.
Bart - We need another Vietnam to thin out their ranks a little.
Bart - We need another Vietnam to thin out their ranks a little.
That line is hilarious. It satirizes some of the more ridiculous justifications for war. This doesn't mean the show writers were pining for another Vietnam. Quite the contrary. The Dead Kennedys are basically saying the same thing. It's fascinating, yet a little depressing, that so many Americans enthusiastically take this at face value.
That line is hilarious. It satirizes some of the more ridiculous justifications for war. This doesn't mean the show writers were pining for another Vietnam. Quite the contrary. The Dead Kennedys are basically saying the same thing. It's fascinating, yet a little depressing, that so many Americans enthusiastically take this at face value.
Sheesh, listen to a little bit of Sly & The Family Stone. It won't make one understand the ghettos. But it's fun. Nothing wrong with that.
@Tamaranis Jello is not saying that he and his clued-in listeners would survive and that the targets of the song would not and should therefore actually be sent there as punishment. The song uses large doses of irony. He is saying that nobody (including himself) raised as a privileged softie American could possibly last 5 minutes in Cambodia, and if they went there on "holiday," they would learn this very quickly. The song makes the statement that his (and my) generation, sometimes called Generation Jones, the cultural generation that came between The Woodstock Generation and Generation X, needs to drop...
@Tamaranis Jello is not saying that he and his clued-in listeners would survive and that the targets of the song would not and should therefore actually be sent there as punishment. The song uses large doses of irony. He is saying that nobody (including himself) raised as a privileged softie American could possibly last 5 minutes in Cambodia, and if they went there on "holiday," they would learn this very quickly. The song makes the statement that his (and my) generation, sometimes called Generation Jones, the cultural generation that came between The Woodstock Generation and Generation X, needs to drop the mindless worship of mass murderers like Chairman Mao and find a political path that actually has a workable endgame. Because Communism, especially as practiced in Asia, had so far led to nightmarish horrors. He's saying wake up, get off your privileged honky ass, and study up on the reality of what it is these stupid hippies have been advocating. A virtual, not actual, holiday in Cambodia, if you will.