Top 5 Pleasure Songs:
1) Bone Thugs N Harmony, "Weed Song", Rap, 2000
2) Lloyd, "Lay it Down", R &B, 2010
3) Lloyd ft. The Dream, "I Need Love", R & B, 2009
4) Rihanna, "S & M", Pop, 2010
5) Eminem, "Drug Ballad", Rap, 2000
Top Video For Pleasure:
Top 5 Community Service Songs:
1) Michael Jackson, "We Are The World", Pop, 1985
2) Michael Jackson, "Man in the Mirror", Pop, 1988
3) Michael Jackson, "Heal the World", Pop, 1991
4) Bone Thugs N Harmony, "Change the World", Rap, 2000
5) Tupac, "Changes", Rap, 1998
Top Video for Community Service:
I felt that the aim that was most prevelant was the pleasure aim, which didn't surprise me at all. Pleausre is something that most people in our society like to indulge in. Even in bookstores there are tons of kama sutra books (not that I go searching for them), and plenty of people will buy them without even knowing the true meaning behind it. Much of what we do in our society is something that will please us, from eating sweets, to listening to a good song on the radio, to going out drinking with friends. While doing this assignment I found that it was much easier searching for songs about love, drugs, and alcohol, than it was to find songs about helping others. I feel that this is because artists like to make songs that their listeners can relate to, and not to say that nobody cares about helping people, but everyone can relate to doing something that is pleasurable to them. I chose Bone Thugs N Harmony's "Weed Song" as my top song for pleausre because it's a song about getting high, which is something that is pleasurable to some but only lasts for a certain amount of time, and that's what pleasure is, it's temporary. In the song they say that if everyone would smoked, their minds would be at ease, thus making the world better. It makes since because if everyone is happy there'd be less conflict. The way that these songs talk of pleasure differs from the Hindu perspective of pleasure because it is more modern. Also, Hindus seek pleasure for religious purposes and do so virtously. Whereas in modern day Western society we do things such as drugs and alcohol because we feel like it, because we want to have fun. For Hindus, pleausre is a goal they seek to achieve in life, as opposed to modern day society where pleasure is just something to pass the time. The Community Service aim is different than modern day societies view of community service because Hindus seek to fulfill the duties that are assigned to that persons caste. Obviously, in Western culture people are not born into a set caste.
Your the first person I've seen make the caste connection and I think it is very good point. Hindu people in a sense preform community service from childhood just because who they were born too. That task alone is very daunting but yet it seems thats the way of their life and people are proud to fulfil these tasks. A westerner thinks i'll donate my amercian eagle jeans to good will and I'm good for a few months. Its crazy how different the idea of community serivce is recieved.
ReplyDeleteYou made a great point that pleasure in Eastern religions is different than Western religions. In the east pleasure is all about seeking meaning and less about getting the new high or the newest sex book.
ReplyDeleteI have to agree with the part of today in the West the mentality is " we just wanna have fun" it's true, While as in the hindu religion it's just to believe in something and hope that later in life or the hereafter we become something better to a greater cause then ourselves.
ReplyDeleteI really think you made a great point in expanding the idea of pleasure to things other than songs! The books, the drugs, the outings with friends are all relative to the topic of 'pleasure' and it's great that you made the connection with this blog assignment. I mean, it's all relative to American culture and I can't believe I haven't considered it before reading your entry.
ReplyDeleteIt could possibly be our age group (which you stated has a role part in it) that focuses on the 'having fun in life' so we tend to listen to songs that relate to our likes and favorite types of pleasure. It is still my belief that Americans are selfish in general so your ideas may pertain to a variety of age groups.
I also agree with the Western world doing things to pass the time and to live in the moment while the Hindu followers did things for an overall achievement in life. I think our class search for songs that are pleasurable and that relate to community service resulted in songs that are a little bit of a stretch compared to the Hindu aims.