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

[alymid.livejournal.com]

I think that if you look at a LOT of modern media you'll find that current portrayals of love really tend towards unhealthy - but its okay "because they are in love".

Isn't it romantic when a guy won't leave a girl alone because he loves her SO much.

[almeda.livejournal.com]

Paging Stephenie Meyer, will Ms. Meyer come to the creep-colored courtesy phone, please ...

(Since Twilight is an absolutely perfect example of that sort of thing that's becoming MASSIVELY popular and profitable ... there's some quite thinky discussion relevant to it here for those who've managed to avoid hearing about it before now)