School Removes “God” From Lee Greenwood Song
The. Name. Of. The. Song. Is. "God Bless the USA"... NO ONE thought that it would be a problem to just change the name??? What gets me, though, is that they even thought about using this song in a school program in Massachusetts, of all places. Did they think that no one would pick up on the fact that they were changing an anthemic song? Like folks weren't going to notice the striking similarity between "God Bless the USA" and "We Love the USA"??Parents at a Massachusetts elementary school are furious after educators first removed the word ‘God’ from the popular Lee Greenwood song, “God Bless the U.S.A.” and then pulled the song all together from an upcoming concert.
Fox 25 in Boston is reporting that children at Stall Brook Elementary School in Bellingham were told to sing, “We love the U.S.A.” instead of “God Bless the U.S.A.”
Look, I understand that, being a school in Massachusetts of all places you'd be reluctant to showcase a song with "God" in the title. But here's the thing - when it's a song as widely known as Lee Greenwood's "God Bless the USA", you do one of two things: you either run with it and take whatever lumps from chosing a song with "God" in it come your way, or you don't use it. You don't bastardize it into something it's not - and hey! Look! You got a metric sh*tload of controversy anyways!
It's freedom *of* religion, not freedom *from* religion. Any child that was honestly offended by the inclusion of the word "God" in a song to be sung could very easily be excused with zero punishment. It's not like the school was requiring the students to pray here (you know, like in a mosque or anything), just sing a patriotic song. And, predictably, the school administrators exhibited the expected "take my ball and go home" end result - they canceled all songs.
It seems like in their rush to not offend a small minority, they wound up offending everyone...
That is all.
6 comments:
You know, I bet there are some copyright issues there, too. I remember from my high school band days that a lot of the conductor's copies of music (that the school had to buy to be able to perform the piece legally) had notes about how certain alterations weren't allowed. Generally, altering the lyrics or changing the 'character' of the piece were prohibited.
That's a pretty substantial change, if you ask me.
Sooo... God damn the USA? Is that what I'm understanding they want?
It's a good song and very patriotic, but after rehearsing it every night at lights out in basic training for eight weeks, singing with 400 other grown men at graduation, and hearing it at every parade, end of month flag ceremony, retirement, and big to-do until I left the military, I can't stand to hear it.
But yeah, if you're going to sing a patriotic song, own it and sing it the way the author wrote it. If you don't want to sing the song the way it's supposed to be sung, don't sing it.
Is God Bless America also a no-no?
Battle Hymn of the Republic?
The National Anthem? (check out verse 4)
These people really are NOT my countrymen. At best buffoons. At worst bayonet practice.
Stretch, "God Bless America" is OK because it refers to a generic deity or divine apparition. The "Battle Hymn" is of course off limits because it promotes violence as well as Protestantism. "America the Beautiful" is marginally OK if you butcher the chorus enough to remove specific religious context. And we all know that no one ever gets past the first verse of the National Anthem.
Yeah, I spent too much time around that sort of crowd. G-d help us all.
LittleRed1
I *completely* agree with you that this is ludicrous. Just pick a different song if you have a problem with it. There are plenty of patriotic songs that mention God only incidentally.
However, as a kid who grew up atheist in a very Christian town - just getting excused from the religious exercises was nowhere close to as easy as it's made out to be. Not only did it usually require much more planning than you expected to have available (oh, hey, there's going to be group prayer at the school rally for 9/11 victims? Umm, can I get out of that? Oh, I needed to make that decision yesterday [when I didn't know there was going to be prayer until I got there] , and find the one teacher who was available to watch me?) but it also tends to require a fair amount of social courage (And then explain to everyone in my class why I "hate America"? Guess I'll go pray).
I mean, I dealt with it, and I lived... because listening to someone pray or say the word God in a song isn't going to kill you. But it's not hard to send a pretty strong message that "you do not belong here because you do not believe this."
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