SOCIAL MEDIA

22 Mar 2011

Rebecca Black's life lessons

If you haven't heard of Rebecca Black yet then 1) I apologise for what you're about to witness, 2) You clearly haven't been on the internet this past week. Welcome back, and 3) You obviously don't know your days of the week yet.

Firstly, here is the video...


And here were my reactions, in order...



 

I would analyse this in depth at this point, but I'm not going to for 3 reasons. It's already been analysed, parodied, and blogged (guilty) to death. The analysis would only point out the obvious ridiculousness parts, e.g. 13 year olds driving a car after waiting at a bus stop. Rebecca Black is also only 13 years old and after admittedly taking the mick out of her for over a week, I now feel quite bad. So instead I'm going to explain the reasoning behind the video and the aftermath. LET'S BEGIN.

The song and video was produced by Ark Music Factory who take on teens wishing to be singers. Note that Clarence Jay and Patrice Wilson, the owners of the company, also write the songs. Rebecca didn't have a part in the songwriting process. Her mum paid $2000 for her daughter to be a pop singer for the day and enjoy herself with all her friends. That's it. I have friends who did exactly the same at that age for birthdays (though didn't pay that much). If their songs went on YouTube then this instance would have happened a long time ago. Basically, none of this is Rebecca Black's fault and some of the comments on the video following it going viral are HORRENDOUS. Real nasty snaps and death threats. She's 13! If anyone should have the comments thrown at them it should be Ark Music Factory who autotune their artists to the extent that it could be anyone singing, and clearly lack creativity and logic. Anyone could have been given this shite song to perform and they would have received the same amount of abuse. 

Like I said before, I'll admit that I thought Rebecca was an idiot to start with and mimicked the song no end at school. Our whole common room sang the bloody song on Friday. I've seen countless parodies and dubs too, most of which were hilarious. But then I thought about Rebecca reading all these comments, seeing all of these parodies and maybe even hearing the abuse first hand in person. I crumble at one person criticising me. Actually it doesn't even have to be a criticism, just a negative comment or a disagreement, so I can't even begin to imagine what she felt when millions of people crushed her. THIRTEEN! I'm nearly 18 and would be a mess. 

Then I saw this... 



Good on her! Her answers were brilliant and she genuinely seems like a lovely girl. She must have grown thick skin this past week but has bravely stood her ground and faced up to the responses the video has received. I couldn't quite believe that the interviewer read out some comments and didn't hold back, but Rebecca smiled the whole time and even though she admitted that she did cry (who wouldn't?) she brushed them all off with answers that I would've given. And she CAN sing! Listen to her sing part of the National Anthem. She's pretty damn good in my opinion so all of that ridiculous autotuning was totally unnecessary. Match her voice with a GOOD song and she'll get all the attention for the right reasons. 

Ark Music Factory have completely let her down and should realise that they should take responsibility for the nasty backlash. They owe poor Rebecca an apology. Now excuse me while I choose which seat to take at the dinner table.

1 comment :

  1. I totally agree with your post. What you say shows a lot of maturity and common-sense.

    Whether people like the music or not, this should not become an excuse for a hate campaign against a 13 year old girl. She is an innocent and has the same rights as anyone else.

    For those who agree, check out the Facebook campaign 'Defend Rebecca Black'. No one deserves to be bullied!

    James

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