A Song by Colbie Caillat
March 16, 2011
YOUNGFOGEY writes:
From our previous discussions of Lady Gaga, I know you are a connoisseur of music videos. I thought it might be worth drawing your attention to this one. I would love to hear your take on it. It’s for a song by Colbie Caillat. She’s known for pop songs that are melodic and peppy. She writes songs about her feelings and about boys, you know, girl stuff. This one is no different.
Now, for all I know she may be an axe murderer in real life, but her public image, especially as compared to other pop icons like Gaga, is so wholesome and traditional. What makes this video so shocking is that near the end of the song she makes a taboo admission in the lyrics. Here we have a pretty young woman who is able to remain mostly clothed for three full three minutes and then she starts singing about her desire to be married and have a family!!! And with a man!!
Weird.
The very fact that I noticed this says something.
Laura writes:
She is a beautiful woman with a lovely smile.
I know this isn’t Lady Gaga eating raw flesh onstage. This isn’t flaming nihilism and I guess that’s reason to be relieved. With its cheerful guitar chords and sweet touches, her video is relatively innocent and wholesome. But it sends a disastrous message. As a fairy tale, it doesn’t work.
The problem isn’t girls wanting marriage. Most girls would admit they do. The problem is thinking they can have it after they’ve slept around and earned enough money to have a fantastic apartment like this, complete with a dog, great furniture and a fully-stocked kitchen. Colbie says that’s all possible and it’s perfectly okay to sleep with a man (is that a man?) before thinking about marriage.
It’s interesting how passive the man is here. I can’t imagine conversing with this guy. Is this the contemporary woman’s masculine ideal? This boy with his cute hat and dreadlocks? How does a woman adjust when she encounters a real man who is not so passive and kittenish and who may have ideas of his own? Colbie doesn’t seem worried about whether this boy-toy will want to marry her. She’s celebrating the fact that she wants it.
Also, little girls see this and because Colbie (is that a girl’s name?) is so beautiful, they automatically want to imitate her look and her sensuality. She’s dressed in her underwear. Colbie doesn’t seem to have much pride. A woman this beautiful doesn’t need to be dressed in her underwear or wear something revealing to convey her beauty or to exude femininity.
Laura adds:
If someone had showed me this video and not told me what it was, I would have guessed it was a commercial for coffee or air freshener. Music videos have been bad for music. They always seem to be selling something too hard. I don’t know why so many people have passively given in to watching commercials. When I was in college in the late 70s, commercials were considered evil attempts at mind control by the establishment. You know, the man enslaving the people. Now they seem to be embraced as art forms in their own right.
— Comments —
Youngfogey writes:
Indeed. I agree with much that you say here, but I do think that the actual connection of romantic and sexual desire to family is so unusual in popular culture it is worth noting.
Also, yes, that person she is with is male. Apparently you haven’t heard that the most desirable quality in a boyfriend these days is that he be able to wear his girlfriend’s jeans.
