The contemporary society is full of things that can, possibly, affect the minds of young people adversely. Whatever these young people listen to, watch on television or in videos or even hear from others has the possibility of influencing their lives for the better or for the worse. One such phenomenon that has greatly polluted the minds of young people is music.
Young people are fond of listening to controversial music that can adversely affect their minds and even lead to depression in them. Being young, I am no exception.
My favourite genre of music is rock which is mostly filled with pessimistic and angry messages in its lyrics. This paper is an exploration of how the lyrics in popular music may cause thinking errors in people and, possibly, lead to depression.
Rock is one kind of music in which most songs portray the same message. The message in the lyrics of rock songs is mostly that life is not worth living with the lyrics filled with numerous pessimistic and angry lines.
Take for example the rock song I Hate Everything About You that is done by Three Days Grace. The lyrics of this song show a lot of hopelessness. First the singer shows how much he hates his girlfriend and asks why he does love her.
This is an indication that relationships are more or less meant for convenience and that a person can hook up with just anybody. The listener may fail to get the reason why love is mixed with hate in this song. The singer claims that he loves his girlfriend and yet he hates everything about her.
Life is also portrayed negatively since it does not make sense for the singer to continue seeing his girlfriend if he hates everything about her. As stated above, the lyrics show how hopeless life is to the singer. This is a perfect example of thinking errors caused by depression.
It can be assumed that the singer spends a lot of time thinking about how imperfect his girlfriend is and being angry about it. This is the definition of depression. The song can potentially make another person to scrutinize their relationships more leading to a depression like that of the singer.
Another similar song is She Hates Me, a rock song done by Puddle Of Mudd. The singer explains how he met a girl and fell in love with her. After knowing each other, he came to realize that she hated him.
It is apparent from this explanation that the singer is very negative towards relationships and life. All he can see in the relationship is that the girl hates him and he cannot help to say he is glad that he split up with her.
The lyrics are very hopeless and shows a person who lacks self esteem and who is probably in depression due to the same. The negativity in the sing can also be very infectious to a listener who likes the song. It may make the listener to develop the characteristics of the singer portrayed in the lyrics.
From the discussion above, it is apparent that the lyrics in popular music can have very disastrous effects on its listeners. People listening to negative, pessimistic and angry lyrics in a genre they like may be influenced to develop these characteristics. Most of these cases may eventually result in the depression of the listener due to the thinking errors in the song.