Music is a powerful medium for expressing human emotion.  U2 front man Bono once said, “Music can change the world because it can change people.”  Bono knows exactly what he is talking about as a Grammy winning artist who has sold millions of albums in a career that has spanned decades.  Music can be a powerful force and influence in our lives.

The music scene can be a challenging one for parents and teens to navigate since it is constantly changing.  The guiding principles that we have been discussing for weeks now will play a major factor later in this post.  But let’s take a look at some quick statistics about music…

• 4 out of every 5 teenagers admit to having engaged in music piracy.  Did you miss last week’s posts about music piracy?  It is a must read!
• Only 48% of teenagers have ever heard anyone discuss the morality of the messages in music
• 51% of teens who consistently listen to music with a sexual message become sexually active within a two year period
• The average teen listens to 2 hours of music a day

The Music Landscape

A quick glance at the iTunes top 10 chart yields a surprising variety of music.  Planted at #1 is pop superstar Justin Bieber with “Heartbreaker,” an R&B influenced song typical of the young superstar these days.  Another teen, 16 year-old Lorde holds the #2 spot with smash song “Royals.”  Veteran rockers Pearl Jam find themselves at #3 on the list with a new single from their latest album.  The top 10 also includes 2 tracks from Miley Cyrus and new songs from top 10 artists like Katy Perry, Drake, and Lady Gaga.

Closing out the lineup at #10 is Ylvis with their social media driven hit “The Fox (What Does the Fox say?)”  Ylvis is a pair of brothers who host a talk show in Norway and actually made the song and video as a joke for the kick off of a new season of their show.  In a recent interview they joked about how they purposely tried to write the worst song they could.  That ‘worst song ever’ is now on the iTunes top 10 list and the video is about to pass the 1 billion view mark at time of publication.

Out of Touch

A good number of parents will know very few of the names on the top 10 list.  Most will know Justin Bieber since he is a pop culture phenomenon.  Some will know Pearl Jam from their days as a teenager.  But for the most part, parents struggle to keep up with the latest and greatest in the music world.

It is especially important for parents to guide young ears on their musical journey.  A vast majority of popular music is simply inappropriate for the teen and pre-teen set.  But music tends to be one of the places where I see parents ‘give’ a little bit in the name of being a cool parent or for the sake of ‘letting kids be kids.’

Gone are the days of innuendo and suggestive lyrics.  The profit-driven music machine of today is fueled by songs filled with explicit language and over-the-top sexual lyrics.  So many of the artists are ‘played’ by the industry and find themselves used up and burnt out after an explosive and meteoric rise to the top.

I Just Like The Beat

Every time I have ever spoken about music, someone will come up with the retort, “I just like the beat” as an excuse for listening to songs with explicit content.  What better way for an industry to send a corrupting message than by following the ‘spoon full of sugar’ formula.  Give the song a beat and a catchy hook and the audience will soak up whatever they are being fed.

Popular Music Is About Money

The driving force of popular music is money.  In the era of auto-tuning, performers need minimal singing and musical talent. A recent stir-up in the industry has brought this idea to the surface again.  Reigning ‘shock star’ Miley Cyrus recently listed music veteran Sinead O’Connor as an influence for a recent video where she is naked and licking a sledge hammer.  O’Connor retorted with an open letter written “in the spirit of motherliness and with love.”

The key point of the open letter is this statement that I have edited for this site – “The music business doesn’t [care] about you, or any of us.  They will prostitute you for all you are worth, and cleverly make you think its what YOU wanted…and when you end up in rehab as a result of being prostituted, ‘they’ will be sunning themselves on their yachts in Antigua, which they bought by selling your body and you will find yourself very alone.”

The words of an industry veteran clearly convey that pop-culture is a business.  I have been criticized again and again by people who say we can’t “shelter our children” or leave them vulnerable to “ambush” by not exposing them to the music, movies, and other media content of this machine.  I personally don’t want my kids engaged in a destructive, profit-focused industry until they are old enough to understand the implications of what they choose to listen to and watch.

Guiding Principles: Lovely

Last week I didn’t write about guiding principles in order to save this specific principle for this post.  I have been using Philippians 4:8 as the source for guiding principles for my children.  The text emphasizes the things that a Christian (young or old) should be thinking about or meditating upon.  The fifth thing listed in that passage is the ideal of “whatever is lovely.”

I’ll warn you now that this guiding principle is going to delve off into a topic that many people are offended by – modesty.  Sinead O’Connor knew very well what the industry was doing to the pop star of the moment.  Any honest observer can see the trend of meteoric success followed quite often by disastrous collapse.  An industry that ‘prostitutes’ it’s stars, male and female, would have a difficult time meeting the ideal of ‘lovely.’

Many times when parents and others are wrestling with the idea of modesty we try to set limits on the length of this and that and how much skin to show.  A family focused on the guiding principle of ‘lovely’ might be a better fit.  Our young women and men shouldn’t aim for being sexy but instead for true, honorable, just, pure, and lovely in the way they dress and act.  I have talked to one too many teenagers who have been disrespected by their boyfriend or girlfriend because they lost focus on the guiding principles of a young Christian.  Allow yourself to be ‘pimped out’ by the latest trends of culture and you shouldn’t be surprised when you reap the results of this world.

Modesty isn’t a matter of inches and what is covered, it is a set of ideals and values that honor God and self.  If you are a lovely person inside and out you will find yourself surrounded by people who honor the same ideals that you do.

New to this series of posts?  View all related posts by clicking HERE.

Family Worship Series

Don’t forget to check out the latest installment of my year-long family worship series… Week 41 – The People Worship Idols