As the first song of the album, "American Idiot" shows Jesus' frustration with where he's living. It's implied that the town he lives in is one of those perfect little towns where the citizens are all easily-manipulated, happy people who blindly follow big institutions like the media and government. Jesus is a character very much against this. He's sick of hearing the media everywhere and watching it alter his peers' opinions. The song's purpose to the story is to show why Jesus would want to leave home. However, "American Idiot" is one of the songs on the album that has a meaning more important to real life than to the story.
Billie Joe has explained how he began writing the song. Listening to a song in which the artist expressed his admittance of being a redneck but also rejoicing in that status, Billie Joe felt disgusted. He wondered how anyone could be proud of being a redneck, one of the worst things to be in Armstrong's opinion. He supposedly got back to the studio and began writing "American Idiot" to sort of "counter" songs like the one he had just heard.
So going through the lyrics:
Armstrong doesn't want to be an American Idiot like that redneck singer (and many other 'mericans). Our nation is under the media in the sense that we believe anything that were told. Luckily, a handful of us have been able to understand that you can't trust anything you read on the internet, but sometimes those people forget to apply that logic to everything, believing everything they hear in books or TV. I interpret the "subliminal mind-fuck" of America to be saying that the government and media have subliminally snuck their way into our minds, controlling us when we don;t ever realize it, creating a mind-fuck of a country where individuality is lacking, and crazy shit happens all the time because of it.
I think this "new kind of tension" is how the struggles seem to be more about current social issues that were never really problems for our country during earlier time periods. The television likes to show us all the happy lives of the Kardashians etc. as if they're living the American dream that we are all supposed to want but never will get.
Billie Joe would rather be called a faggot, a common word that bigoted conservatives use to attack liberals, than be associated with the redneck agenda of Bush and an unfortunately large number of far-right-winged people. America likes to use propaganda to get us riled up about some issue, so that we will let it attack our personal liberties. We all end up with this "paranoia" that unconsciously changes our minds and stops us from caring if our country infringes upon our rights.
Basically, Billie Joe is disappointed in our country, and wants us to be better by beginning to question things (as expressed in "Warning"). He's not Anti-American, as many believe because of this song. It's more like he's disappointed in the beliefs and actions of someone he cares about. Just like how we may speak rudely to those we are comfortable with (yelling at our sisters and wives, but silently accepting whatever our distant teachers/bosses say) Instead of accepting America, Armstrong would rather show it where its mistakes are and allow it to better itself, which it can only do if its citizens' mindsets change.
As the first song of the album, "American Idiot" shows Jesus' frustration with where he's living. It's implied that the town he lives in is one of those perfect little towns where the citizens are all easily-manipulated, happy people who blindly follow big institutions like the media and government. Jesus is a character very much against this. He's sick of hearing the media everywhere and watching it alter his peers' opinions. The song's purpose to the story is to show why Jesus would want to leave home. However, "American Idiot" is one of the songs on the album that has a meaning more important to real life than to the story.
Billie Joe has explained how he began writing the song. Listening to a song in which the artist expressed his admittance of being a redneck but also rejoicing in that status, Billie Joe felt disgusted. He wondered how anyone could be proud of being a redneck, one of the worst things to be in Armstrong's opinion. He supposedly got back to the studio and began writing "American Idiot" to sort of "counter" songs like the one he had just heard.
So going through the lyrics: Armstrong doesn't want to be an American Idiot like that redneck singer (and many other 'mericans). Our nation is under the media in the sense that we believe anything that were told. Luckily, a handful of us have been able to understand that you can't trust anything you read on the internet, but sometimes those people forget to apply that logic to everything, believing everything they hear in books or TV. I interpret the "subliminal mind-fuck" of America to be saying that the government and media have subliminally snuck their way into our minds, controlling us when we don;t ever realize it, creating a mind-fuck of a country where individuality is lacking, and crazy shit happens all the time because of it.
I think this "new kind of tension" is how the struggles seem to be more about current social issues that were never really problems for our country during earlier time periods. The television likes to show us all the happy lives of the Kardashians etc. as if they're living the American dream that we are all supposed to want but never will get.
Billie Joe would rather be called a faggot, a common word that bigoted conservatives use to attack liberals, than be associated with the redneck agenda of Bush and an unfortunately large number of far-right-winged people. America likes to use propaganda to get us riled up about some issue, so that we will let it attack our personal liberties. We all end up with this "paranoia" that unconsciously changes our minds and stops us from caring if our country infringes upon our rights.
Basically, Billie Joe is disappointed in our country, and wants us to be better by beginning to question things (as expressed in "Warning"). He's not Anti-American, as many believe because of this song. It's more like he's disappointed in the beliefs and actions of someone he cares about. Just like how we may speak rudely to those we are comfortable with (yelling at our sisters and wives, but silently accepting whatever our distant teachers/bosses say) Instead of accepting America, Armstrong would rather show it where its mistakes are and allow it to better itself, which it can only do if its citizens' mindsets change.