check it. before you wreck it.
the latest weezer video is sweet. we’re talkin’ candy-coated goodness. i haven’t been able to find much information, but it seems that they have preemptively censored themselves.
it’s a fact, jack, that mtv(2) will mute out any words they deem offensive. this usually includes drug references, but not sexual innuendo. so if your song includes the word ‘drugs’ 64 times, there is a good chance you won’t hear the word even one time. welcome to free america, where tv stations decide the words we get to hear. last i checked, the words ‘drugs’, ‘hash’, and ‘pot’ were not considered obscenities.
i’m guessing that rivers and company decided to edit their song/video to be ‘we are all in love’, so that it didn’t end up being ‘we are all on #####’. and in case you didn’t watch the video from the link above, or that site sucks and it didn’t work for you (because that site does suck and i had trouble getting it to work for me), i will explain the genius behind the video. rivers leaves his home and goes on an adventure through the city where everyone he encounters mouths the words “on drugs” when the song is singing “in love”. this is brilliant for two reasons… 1. mtv would have to fuzz out every mouth and they won’t do that (not yet, anyway). 2. it’s subliminal and it works, because even if you haven’t heard the song before, you find yourself thinking “on drugs” instead of “in love”.
i don’t know the rationale behind mtv’s hatred for drugs, but i’ll take a stab at it. it’s to protect the kids, right? if i get the chance to raise some bambinos, i want them to know everything about drugs, because the only way for them to make an informed decision about trying them or not, is by being informed. shielding them and hiding them from the big bad needles and the long acrylic bongs will only make them more curious. don’t act like things don’t exist, just because you don’t want to deal with them.