The thing with Rudolph...

[conuly]

I know the message we're supposed to take from that song. Sometimes, people are mean, and make fun of others because they're different. But that doesn't make the different one less valuable - differences are just that. They don't have to be defects. We can all relate to that at some level, can't we?

Pity it's not the message I ever actually took from that song. The message I got was "If you're different, people will make fun of you (well, I already knew that). But if you're useful to them, they'll crowd around you and pretend to be nice, just so long as you're useful (I kinda knew that too)."

Wonder what happened to Rudolph when the fog cleared up? Bet everybody retreated into their old ways again, real fast. And as soon as it got foggy, there they'd be, asking him so nicely to do a favor "because we're friends".

And Santa was just as bad. He didn't step in and make his anthromorphic reindeer behave. He didn't tell them that being cruel is, well, cruel. He only cared about Rudolph for what he could do, not for the fact that he was being tormented everyday. He's in a position of power, and he does nothing. Great example. You can't trust the grown-ups, because the grown-ups, too, only see what's useful for them to see.

...

It just may be that I overthought this song as a kid, but it really creeped me out then, and now.

Comments

[mortaine.livejournal.com]

I liked Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer as a kid, because I was the one who was always "out" and "different," and the song is about fitting in and being accepted and how your differences can turn into your strengths.

Yes, I suppose it's also about co-opting the strange people when they're economically useful, but when you are six years old and can't understand why nobody likes you, the one thing you would like more than anything else for Christmas is to have people like you and want you around, without having to hide your differences.

[conuly]

That's the situation I was in at that age, except that I didn't want to be friends with most of them, I just didn't want to be completely disliked. It's unpleasant.

And I still didn't like the song. Maybe I was more cynical than you?