Why are there so many pro-stalker pop songs, anyway?

[james_davis_nicoll]

I'll give old-timey folk music a pass because people were stupider and more brutal in the past and if a man went from sunrise to sundown without slaughtering the neighbors to steal their cattle, partaking in a mob attack on the local minorities, burning down the local distillery while stealing a barrel of hard liquor and murdering his entire family while recovering from a hangover, he [1] was probably due to be nominated as a saint.

Modern people don't have the same excuse for backing the wrong side in their songs, so why is it there are so many songs about obsessive stalkers that make the stalker out to be the protagonist? As someone on rasfw pointed out, even when songs are written by people who have been stalked, like McLachlan's Possession, the song is told from the stalker's point of view. Why?




1: Almost all old timey song murderers are guys.

Comments

[burger-eater.livejournal.com]

I blame this guy:



And all the others like him.

[james-nicoll.livejournal.com]

Where is that from?

[burger-eater.livejournal.com]

Say Anything, a much-loved youth romance movie by Cameron Crowe.

[trinfaneb.livejournal.com]

Its true that Lloyd Dobbler holding up the boombox outside his girlfriend's house is stalkerish, but other than that, his character is about the most responsible and intelligent one you'll find in a teen comedy.

[trinfaneb.livejournal.com]

True, these types of movies aren't exactly shining with teenage male role models :) I think Lloyd's main competition is Louden Swain (Mathew Modine's character in "VisionQuest"). He is a relatively advanced male type, despite getting really frisky in one scene with the good- looking girl his father let live with them, but Louden did stop when she told him to.