AOL/Time Warner Conspiracy Against Rock Music, by fjord

Evil plot to make sure bad music, and unattainable ideals of physical beauty and soulless love infect the youth. A buy-product? Rock n Roll has it's definition perverted, and isn't cool any more.

I have discovered a shocking secret ploy by AOL to de-popularize rock music, and keep Boy Bands and Teen Divas on top for the future generations. One day I was at a friend of a friend's house. There was an 8 or 9 year old boy there, and to keep him out of trouble, they stuck him on the computer. While playing his N'sync mp3s, he overheard us talking about music. Since, I wasn't particularly having fun anyway, I continued the conversation with him. I asked him what kinds of music he liked, and he responded something along the lines of:

"Well, I like rock mostly, pretty much anything except for country or jazz or pop."

A little shocked by his assertion that he dislikes pop, yet was clearly enjoying the N'sync, I told him it doesn't get much more "pop" than that. He explained that it sounded like rock to him. He went on to say that he also like BSB, Britney, Christina, etc. (and Kid Rock, but at this point, that's actually a sign of hope) We had a slight discussion about why BSB sounded like rock, and if he liked guitars. He said something like:

"Yeah! I like guitars! Listen, that's some good guitar."

I tried to explain to him (in little kid terms) that there weren't really guitars in that music, it was just computer noises that sounded like guitars, and even then, those sounds were hardly there at all. Using his little kid logic, he insisted that he had seen the Backstreet Boys on TV, and they were playing guitars. I tried to explain the concept of pretending to play guitar, but to no avail. (Avail is a good band, by the way).

So, in an attempt to open his eyes, I asked his permission to look for some other music on the web. Of course, his AOL account had little kid parental controls on it, so I doubted I could go download any Rancid for him. I went to the site of Green Day, figuring that they were well known enough that little kids would like them, and AOL would allow access to their site. No dice. I tried something a little tamer, Foo Fighters. Web Restricted.

Ok, something a little softer. Sister Hazel. Web Restricted.

The most bland radio rock I could think of. Matchbox 20. Web Restricted.

A Christian band. MxPx. Web Restricted. Supertones. Web Restricted. Third Day. Web Restricted. DC Talk. Web Restricted.

Some country music, for cryin' out loud, anything with a guitar. Garth Brooks. Web Restricted.

Some light contemporary Christian. Jars of Clay. Went straight to the site. Ok, but how many little kids are going to be excited by the wussy sounds of something like that? It's not necessarily bad, but more Gospel than Rock really.

This whole time, he has been imploring me to go to the Backstreet Boys website (because apparently to today's youth, that is rock). The page loaded right up. Slightly confused, but not really surprised, I tried Christina Aguilera. Web Restricted. Oh, good, that's a relief. No "Genie in a bottle" for our impressionable kids to "rub the right way." Then it hit me. I forgot to put the dash between first and last name, so it wasn't the "Official" site. I retype, and the page loads up.

So AOL is obviously not protecting our children from bad influences if they let sex symbols and innuendo grace their computer screens, while blocking out even Christian bands (I could make the argument that the majority of real punk bands have a very positive message, but I doubt many parents want their kids listening to Dead Kennedys).

I pondered this for a few minutes when it hit me. Time Warner. Disney. All these companies that work closely with the teenybopper marketing also work closely with AOL. They are protecting their investment. If kids are indoctrinated to listening to bad pop fluff at an early age, the fad can live past the 2-4 year when teen idols typically flourish. All the previous boy bands (Wham, New Kids, etc.) only had very short life spans, but if we breed fans for them, and then get the next batch of idols ready for them (O-town) the trend can last indefinitely!

The only way I can see to stop this is through either a massive letter writing campaign to bring back the rock to mass media (which has already failed, except in the case of Limp Bizkit), or we must take it underground. Here is a plea to all my fellow rock fans! Become Big Brothers and Big Sisters! Take your protege's to rock concerts! Be careful with them, no Pearl Jam concerts for ten-year-olds, but let them watch the local garage band practice (with earplugs of course). If a small indie rock band comes through, make arrangements with the local club owner to let them sit somewhere safe, and keep a close eye on them (all ages shows only of course). Don't be irresponsible, but do try to expose youth of today (YOT were another good band) to the wonderful world of sensible rock and roll rebellion. It is our only hope to combat Britney Spear's plan for world domination.