the worst Christmas song..
I posted about this last year too, but the absolute worst song at this time of year is that damn "Christmas Shoes" one. It's on the radio and in the malls and stores all over this year, again, and it's impossible for me to understand the appeal of it. I understand the basic sentiment of the song is to remind people that there are sick and poor and unfortunate people at Christmas, but I mean the whole song - the lyrics, the premise, the music, everything - is just tacky and maudlin. It does a total disservice to the families who are in a bad way at Christmas time.
As one critic put it:
"The little boy in the lyrics is poor, his mother is about to die and he doesn’t have enough money to buy her new shoes. The singer-narrator thinks that God sent him the little boy so that he, the narrator, could be reminded about the true meaning of Christmas. Now, I am going to go out on a limb here a little and suggest that God’s plan does not include killing a young woman and leaving an orphan and widower behind so that some self-satisfied prick in a department store can feel a little bit of heaven’s love. How self-centered, how completely and totally disconnected from the spirit of the Gospels do you have to be to think that God would kill a person and crush a little boy’s heart so that you could learn a little lesson about the spirit of giving?"
Another criticism of the song occurs to me. The song is clearly leveled at the Christian-family values-mid-western-southern audience. But what system of "family values" would one have to consider it good for a little kid out by himself shopping on Christmas Eve, when his mother is dying? Shouldn't he be with her? Or at the minimum, being watched by a relative?
These are values? These and a subway token wouldn't get you on a subway!
As one critic put it:
"The little boy in the lyrics is poor, his mother is about to die and he doesn’t have enough money to buy her new shoes. The singer-narrator thinks that God sent him the little boy so that he, the narrator, could be reminded about the true meaning of Christmas. Now, I am going to go out on a limb here a little and suggest that God’s plan does not include killing a young woman and leaving an orphan and widower behind so that some self-satisfied prick in a department store can feel a little bit of heaven’s love. How self-centered, how completely and totally disconnected from the spirit of the Gospels do you have to be to think that God would kill a person and crush a little boy’s heart so that you could learn a little lesson about the spirit of giving?"
Another criticism of the song occurs to me. The song is clearly leveled at the Christian-family values-mid-western-southern audience. But what system of "family values" would one have to consider it good for a little kid out by himself shopping on Christmas Eve, when his mother is dying? Shouldn't he be with her? Or at the minimum, being watched by a relative?
These are values? These and a subway token wouldn't get you on a subway!