Diary Adventures of LagosMums: DALM | Fast Food and Music Videos
I do not watch music videos at home. Not because I don’t enjoy some of the music but mainly because of the videos themselves. The videos seem to be competing for the title of the most obscene. I have a problem with women being portrayed  like objects to be put on display with a switch button that says scantily dressed and gyrating.
I also have children I am raising and I do not want them watching these videos. I do not want my daughter thinking it is okay to dress or dance this way. Feeding on these types of videos translates to the children in some form, have you seen how some girls dance at birthday parties? It must be because they watch these videos (or are learning from their aunties who watch these videos). Side note – You will be surprised at what your nanny might have on her phone and plays for your children when you are not there.
As for my son I do not want him thinking he is supposed to see girls as objects for his entertainment while twisting their waists.
Is there an agreement between fast food and music videos? Over the past week for some reason I have found myself at fast food restaurants and have been assaulted by these types of videos – Yes I call it assaulted because I look up from placing an order and I see quite endowed women in short shorts backing the camera and shaking it for all it’s worth. I am only exposed to these when I go to fast food restaurants it seems, why exactly do they only have channels perpetually turned to these music video channels? what about news?
This is one of the reasons why fast food restaurants are not family outings for us – we would rather do the drive thru. It does not make sense to work so hard at home to avoid the children watching these videos only to have then soak it all in over 30 minutes if we go to a fast food place. The more they watch the more it almost validates that this is the way every song and they start to associate songs with raunchy dance. Once though I had to ask the manager of the fast food restaurant to change the channel to a cartoon channel while we were there.
What happened to vides that just sell the song without the R rated aspects? I long for the videos like “I’m every woman” by Chaka Khan or “One Love” by Onyeka Onwenu. When you do find nice current feel good songs and videos like “Happy” by Pharrell Williams or “All the Way” by Eben you want to put it on repeat.
So we need some artists to think about their younger audience, just as there are some songs that have bleeped out swear words, can we get some videos that have bleeped out the obscenity?
For now the only television we watch is on the weekends and for music videos we are tuned to Kingdom Africa (channel 345 on DSTV). It gets our vote for good music that is inspirational, godly and PG. I know I was winning the day my daughter said “oh wow godly music can be fun” this was after listening to “If he did it before” thanks Tye Tribbett.
Parents we can also start to make changes by asking the DJ at children’s birthday parties to play clean PG songs and you will still have fun! Email me if you need a clean playlist for a birthday party!
