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#1 Mar 15 2010 at 2:17 PM Rating: Good
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How truly heart-warming that a US charity single, intended to raise funds for less advantaged countries, inspires such a geniunely wonderful tribute from Japan.

We Are The World

Probably the pinnacle of the interwebs' achievement.

I laughed 'til the tears ran down my legs.
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#2 Mar 15 2010 at 2:29 PM Rating: Good
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#3 Mar 15 2010 at 2:36 PM Rating: Good
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what is this... i don't even...
#4 Mar 15 2010 at 2:41 PM Rating: Good
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It's funny because they're Asian.
#5 Mar 15 2010 at 2:48 PM Rating: Decent
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The Glorious Atomicflea wrote:
It's funny because they're Asian blacked up, tuneless and incomprehensible.
Word
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#6 Mar 15 2010 at 3:12 PM Rating: Good
I wonder how many mooglefUckers will save this link so they can jerk off to Cyndi Lauper-chan.
#7 Mar 15 2010 at 3:13 PM Rating: Good
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When I visited Japan and stayed at a high school, during English class we had to watch an hour and a half movie about the making of "We are the World". The entire class was enraptured. They have such a huge ***** for that song I don't even pretend to understand.
#8 Mar 15 2010 at 3:15 PM Rating: Good
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You went to an English class in Japan?
#9 Mar 15 2010 at 3:20 PM Rating: Good
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Lord Nobby wrote:
The Glorious Atomicflea wrote:
It's funny because they're Asian blacked up, tuneless and incomprehensible.
Word
I would never think blackface was funny, you racist. Smiley: mad

FU2, French Vogue.
#10 Mar 15 2010 at 3:22 PM Rating: Good
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I wonder if they'll latch on to wavin' Flag.
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#11 Mar 15 2010 at 3:30 PM Rating: Decent
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I'm waiting for the Westboro Baptist Church congregation to perform their tribute to classic 'no' theatre.

(works on many levels, no?)
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#12 Mar 15 2010 at 9:25 PM Rating: Good
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The Japanese have a great respect for social responsibility, social cohesiveness, and social harmony. It's no surprise that the lyrics, intentions, and money-raising-for-charity efforts of "We are the world" captivated their imaginations in general.

The Japanese culture in general also has a long entrenched feeling of despisal towards Africans and African Americans, which I presume they learned from their first contact with white English and American colonialists they met with early on, who felt vastly superior to the "barbarian" blacks.

So the "We are the world" collaboration both keys in with Japanese feelings of human harmony, whilst also challenging them by presenting black singers as heroic equals with their white singers in the choir of musical celebrities.

The song and singers is revolutionary to Japanese culture in this way, whilst also tapping into old traditional Japanese roots that revere harmony and peace.
#13 Mar 15 2010 at 9:33 PM Rating: Good
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Aripyanfar wrote:
The Japanese have a great respect for social responsibility, social cohesiveness, and social harmony. It's no surprise that the lyrics, intentions, and money-raising-for-charity efforts of "We are the world" captivated their imaginations in general.

The Japanese culture in general also has a long entrenched feeling of despisal towards Africans and African Americans, which I presume they learned from their first contact with white English and American colonialists they met with early on, who felt vastly superior to the "barbarian" blacks.

So the "We are the world" collaboration both keys in with Japanese feelings of human harmony, whilst also challenging them by presenting black singers as heroic equals with their white singers in the choir of musical celebrities.

The song and singers is revolutionary to Japanese culture in this way, whilst also tapping into old traditional Japanese roots that revere harmony and peace.
So it was yuppie do-gooder music in the US, and is doubly so in Japan?
#14 Mar 15 2010 at 9:59 PM Rating: Good
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AshOnMyTomatoes wrote:
Aripyanfar wrote:
The Japanese have a great respect for social responsibility, social cohesiveness, and social harmony. It's no surprise that the lyrics, intentions, and money-raising-for-charity efforts of "We are the world" captivated their imaginations in general.

The Japanese culture in general also has a long entrenched feeling of despisal towards Africans and African Americans, which I presume they learned from their first contact with white English and American colonialists they met with early on, who felt vastly superior to the "barbarian" blacks.

So the "We are the world" collaboration both keys in with Japanese feelings of human harmony, whilst also challenging them by presenting black singers as heroic equals with their white singers in the choir of musical celebrities.

The song and singers is revolutionary to Japanese culture in this way, whilst also tapping into old traditional Japanese roots that revere harmony and peace.
So it was yuppie do-gooder music in the US, and is doubly so in Japan?

Yup.

But if you go back and look at the original song, the singing talent of the musicians is glorious. The director brought together a wide range of huge talent, (not just stars, but actual singing talent.) He paired up very interesting combinations of singers, in the spot-on conclusion that those pairs of voices would thrillingly complement each other.

The song may seem trite from a world changing perspective. How is a song going to fix the problems of the world? It certainly doesn't address WHY the world is a mess, or how to fix things. "It's just a trite and ultimately meaningless way for Westerners to feel good about themselves." But even if the lyrics are sweet "empty" optimisms, they focus people's minds on happiness, and good will towards other people. That's not a bad thing to focus on, even for a little while.

And the song did raise $63 million for charity in drought stricken Africa at the time, as well as needy charities in the US. Even if a lot of the money trickled away in corruption, a substantial amount of food aid got through.



It's not such a good thing to flippantly dismiss do-gooder stuff. Anything that creates a feeling of good-will towards other people of different cultures and nations, no matter how nebulous, is an action that creates a good feeling that counteracts bad news, and ill-feeling towards people of other cultures and nations. If bad will and alienation is allowed to build up indefinitely, that's when illiterate, poorly educated, poverty stricken people are vulnerable to Fundamentalist arguments and persuasions to turn them towards terrorism.

Edited, Mar 15th 2010 11:04pm by Aripyanfar
#15 Mar 15 2010 at 10:04 PM Rating: Good
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Categorizing it as yuppie music doesn't necessarily mean I didn't like it. Smiley: smile I actually remember clearly the first time I ever heard it. It was the last time my father's entire family had Thanksgiving together at my Great Aunts' house. I was like 6.
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