Footloose

Sometimes I wonder why music is legal. Music can alter your mood and your body chemistry just like any illegal drug. The fact that it goes into your body through your ear shouldn’t make a difference. We take drugs via practically every other hole in our body – mouth, butt, eyeballs, nose – you name it. Ain’t nothing special about an ear.

Music is clearly unsafe. Suppose you’re in a perfectly good mood and a depressing song comes on. That could make you sad and break down your body’s natural defenses. You could get sick and die. Thank you very much Tori Amos.

Many songs are dangerous to hear while operating a motor vehicle. For example, anything by the Magic Numbers (for the moment anyhoo) will force me to exceed the speed limit. You probably have your own songs that make you speed. If you believe in free will you might argue that people always have the choice of NOT speeding. But by that reasoning it should be legal to allow drunks to drive because they have the choice of not doing it.

Let me put it another way. If gum made people more likely to speed, you know there would be a law against chewing and driving. If it goes into your body through your mouth, it’s a drug. If it goes in through your ears, it’s entertainment. That seems random to me.

One way you know you have a drinking problem is if it affects your work. I don’t know about you, but if I have a song stuck in my head, it lowers my I.Q. by about 40 points. I can sometimes do two things at the same time if those two things are easy, such as humming and walking. But if I’m trying to write a blog post or read a text book, a song in my head will turn me into a chimp. Case in point – I have a song in my head right now and this post sucks.

Don’t forget – music is a gateway drug to harder stuff. Music attracts dancing. Dancing attracts alcohol. Alcohol leads to unwanted pregnancies. Unwanted pregnancies lead to abortion. If you believe life begins at conception, you have to believe that music kills babies.

And then there’s the corrosive effect of hip-hop music. I enjoy a lot of it, but after hearing three tracks I have an urge to slap a ho. That can’t be healthy, especially for the ho.

Just to be clear, I don’t think music should be illegal. I just think it’s somewhat random that it isn’t.