“We Con the World”

(Note: this entry has been expanded and updated, with the lyrics of the original 1985 song by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie laid out alongside the take-off, and a video of the all-star performance of the original.)

A great satire on “We Are the World” is performed by The Peace Flotilla Choir, one of whose members is writer Caroline Glick. (For full screen image, click the button with the four outward pointing arrows.)

I said the other day that the “peace flotilla” affair is not a fiasco for Israel, but a victory, because never before have the Israel’s international enemies so clearly revealed what they—and their withering condemnations of Israel—are really about. The brilliance of this satire supports my point.

* * *

How great it is to see a group of Israelis standing up, believing in themselves, and sticking it to their enemies with spirit and humor. For decades, the Israelis have seemed so demoralized and beaten down by the world’s condemnation and hatred of them that even when they were doing the right thing and defending themselves they did so with their shoulders hunched, almost shamefaced. This was largely because the Israelis accept the liberal premises by which they are condemned for existing, even as, via unprincipled exceptions to their liberalism, they do the things they need to do to survive. But the Unprincipled Exception is only a stop-gap measure which leaves people still under the power of liberalism. Ultimately, if a country or people are to live, they must break free of liberalism itself. This video gives me hope that the Israelis have life in them and that their country will survive. And maybe someday we’ll see similar expressions of spirit in England, in France, and the other demoralized, liberal countries of the West.

* * *

The more you listen to the video, the better it gets. The way that New Age, “We’re all one,” uplifting musical sound and the group spirit of the singing is combined with the words of jihadist murder and deception is absolutely brilliant, capturing the reality of the “humanitarian peace flotilla” which is actually a jihad flotilla, supported by a willfully deceived world.

Below are the lyrics of “We Con the World,” written by Tal Gilad, one of the performers, alongside the lyrics of the original song, “We Are the World,” by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie. When I found the original lyrics, I realized that the satire tracks the original very closely, using its words and even rhyming with it at times. For example, Jackson/Richie’s “There’s a choice we’re making / We’re saving our own lives / It’s true, we’ll make a better day / Just you and I,” becomes Gilad’s “We are peaceful travelers / With guns and our own knives / The truth will never find its way / To your TV.” “Lives” becomes “knives,” and the word “true” is carried over with the opposite meaning. Similarly, Jackson/Richie’s “Well, send them your heart / So they know that someone cares,” becomes Gilad’s “Ooooh, we’ll stab them at heart / They are soldiers, no one cares.”

I’ve edited the versification and line breaks of the two versions to show the line-by-line parallel. Thanks to Kidist Paulos Asrat for the HTML code that enabled me to do this.

WE CON THE WORLD

There comes a time
When we need to make a show
For the world, the Web and CNN.

There’s no people dying,
so the best that we can do
Is create the greatest bluff of all.

We must go on
Pretendin’ day by day
That in Gaza, there’s crisis, hunger and plague.
‘Cause the billion bucks in aid
Won’t buy their basic needs
Like some cheese and missiles for the kids.

We’ll make the world
Abandon reason
We’ll make them all believe that the Hamas
Is Momma Theresa.

We are peaceful travelers
With guns and our own knives
The truth will never find its way
To your TV.

Ooooh, we’ll stab them at heart
They are soldiers, no one cares
We are small, and we took some pictures with doves

As Allah showed us,
For facts there’s no demand
So we will always gain the upper hand.

We’ll make the world
Abandon reason
We’ll make them all believe that the Hamas
Is Momma Theresa.

We are peaceful travelers
We’re waving our own knives
The truth will never find its way
To your TV.

If Islam and terror
Brighten up your mood
But you worry
That it may not look so good
Well well well well don’t you realize
You just gotta call yourself
An activist for peace and human aid?

We’ll make the world
Abandon reason
We’ll make them all believe that the Hamas
Is Momma Theresa.

We are peaceful travelers
We’re waving our own knives
The truth will never find its way
To your TV.

We con the world
We con the people
We’ll make them all believe the IDF
Is Jack the Ripper.

We are peaceful travelers
We’re waving our own knives
The truth will never find its way
To your TV.

We con the world
We con the people
We’ll make them all believe the IDF
is Jack the Ripper.

We are peaceful travelers
We’re waving our own knives
The truth will never find its way
To your TV.
WE ARE THE WORLD

There comes a time
When we need a certain call
When the world must come together as one.

There are people dying
Oh it’s time to lend a hand to life,
The greatest gift of all.

We can’t go on
Pretendin’ day by day
That someone somwhere will soon make a change.
We are all part of
God’s great big family
And the truth your love is all we need.

We are the World
We are the children
We are the ones who make a brighter day
so let’s start giving.

There’s a choice we’re making
We’re saving our own lives
It’s true, we’ll make a better day
Just you and I.

Well send them your heart
So they know that someone cares
And lives will be stronger and free.

As God has shown us
By turning stone to bread
And so we all must lend a helping hand.

We are the World
We are the children
We are the ones who make a brighter day
So let’s start giving.

Oh there’s a choice we’re making
We’re saving our own lives
It’s true, we’ll make a better day
Just you and I.

When you’re down and out
There seems no hope at all
But if you just believe,
There’s no way we can fall.
Well well well well let us realize
Oh that a change can only come
When we stand together as one.

We are the World
We are the children
We are the ones who make a brighter day
So let’s start giving.

There’s a choice we’re making
We’re saving our own lives
It’s true, we’ll make a better day
Just you and I.

We are the World
We are the children
We are the ones who make a brighter day
So let’s start giving.

There’s a choice we’re making
We’re saving our own lives
It’s true, we’ll make a better day
Just you and I.

We are the World
We are the children
We are the ones who make a brighter day
So let’s start giving.

There’s a choice we’re making
We’re saving our own lives
It’s true, we’ll make a better day
Just you and I.

* * *

One thing I have to say is, how insipid are the original lyrics compared to the biting incisive words of the take-off. This is to take nothing away from Jackson’s melody which is lovely and stirring, especially in the verse beginning, “We are peaceful travellers…”

For further context, here is the video of the original performance of “We Are the World,” by a collection of pop- and rock-star royalty. By seeing the original, we understand the parody better. For example, in “We Con the World,” I had felt that one of the performers was doing a Dylan take-off on one of the verses. And guess what? In the original performance, Bob Dylan performs the corresponding verse, and the guy in “We Con the World” was imitating the way he did it.

- end of initial entry -

June 6

LA writes:

Here is a website that to put it mildly is not excited by “We Con the World”:

Israel’s ‘Operation Make The World Hate Us’ Enters Bold New Phase as Jerusalem Post Editor Releases Video Mocking Dead Flotilla Activists

Here is Caroline Glick discussing the video at her blog.

Laura G. writes:

One of the great things about this video is that we get to see Caroline Glick in comedienne mode. It is a great example of the truism that humans usually bring their own core essences to all areas of their lives, and these qualities play out in various situations in consistently recognizable ways. In this case, we get the delight of seeing a person who is brilliant in national-political exposition being brilliant in a scathing bit of humor. As always, that humor is based on granite realities, and deeply mocks the pretensions of Israel’s and the US’s mortal enemies. Great stuff! THANKS go to Caroline and all her motley crew!

Jake F. writes:

You wrote:

“One thing I have to say is, how insipid are the original lyrics compared to the biting incisive words of the take-off. This is to take nothing away from Jackson’s melody which is lovely and stirring.”

I have always hated this song, and especially those lyrics. I remember feeling guilty as a teenager—actually guilty!—that I could so viscerally hate something that was supposed to help starving people. Everything about it says, “I’m going to make this earworm shout insipid thoughts to distract your brain while I wring money from your heart.” My mind rebelled.

Perhaps the most egregious lyric in the song is this: “There’s a choice we’re making / We’re saving our own lives.” No, you liars, we’re not saving our own lives. We’re saving theirs. The choice we’re making is specifically to give up something that would make our lives more comfortable, to help people who have no relevance to us except our common humanity.

Yes, altruism is good. Yes, it can even improve us. But we dilute its importance by making false claims about it “saving our own lives.”

And this: “When you’re down and out, / There seems no hope at all. / But if you just believe, / there’s no way we can fall.” Really? First you tell us people are starving, and, frankly, it appears that any death from starvation is already a failure of ours. But now you’re telling us that we just have to “believe.” Believe what? That we can make a change? That sending my paper route money to Ethiopia will prevent its dictator from cruelly oppressing its people? That he won’t use the food we just sent as a weapon among factious clans?

I mean, sure, sending money might help, but even in the best scenario we’ve already failed those who have already died. “There’s no way we can fall” is a blatant, stupid lie.

And this: “let us realize / Oh that a change can only come, / When we stand together as one.” Really? So on the one had, “if you just believe” (which sounds like something I have to do, personally, just one guy) we can’t fall, but a change can only come if we all stand together as one? So my job isn’t just to send money to Ethiopia, because I will fail if I don’t convince THE WORLD (that’s who we are, right?) to stand together?

There’s no room for the individual to make a difference here? Why not just give up? [LA replies: there was a recent ad campaign at New York City bus stops pushing the idea that the only way you can accomplish anything worthwhile is by joining up with the whole human race.]

These are things that I thought then, and I still do, although my basis for hating the mentality of the song has gotten even broader.

One last point: Though you call Jackson’s melody “lovely and stirring,” I simply can’t abide it; maybe the problem is that it’s coupled with those awful lyrics, but either way it’s so saccharine that it makes the whole thing smack of propaganda. But that’s why it works so brilliant in the satire. [LA replies: Well it’s the satire that made the melody work for me. I think I saw/heard “We Are the World” two or three times twenty years ago, and hadn’t thought about it since. I never paid attention to the lyrics until now.]

Jake F. continues:

One last note (I know I’m prattling, but it’s an indicator of how much I hate this song):

We may be part of the world, but we most certainly are not the children. It’s the children who need our help, which is why we men and women should help them. And grown-ups are starving, too, by the way, and their deaths by starvation are hardly better than those of the children.

Even *I* am surprised by how much I hate that song.

Patrick H. writes:

I think you are correct to identify this incident as a marker of a change in how these stories play out. The response has been much less universally hostile to Israel, with lots of web-enabled commenters putting the usual anti-Israel media on the defensive with swift effective responses to their slanted coverage. And in Israel herself, the country is, as the repulsively anti-Israel leftist rag Salon puts it, “astonishingly unified” on the left and the right in their support for the Israeli action, and for the blockade. This unity in Israel is quite new, but has been building over the last decade in a way our Western media have not yet grasped.

Example: I have a friend in Israel, deeply religious but absolutely impeccably left-wing in her politics. She has been a long-time member of Peace Now, was active in the massive demonstrations against the Lebanon incursion in 1982, and to this day is involved in working on “peace issues” with Palestinian groups. And yet … in the Gaza incursion of two years ago, she was utterly disgusted with Hamas for putting missiles next to schools, displaying corpses of children they themselves had killed as agit-prop, and was openly contemptuous of the Western media for actively colluding in what she called the “war crimes” of the “genocidal terrorist organization Hamas.” Israeli contempt for Western media bias is now complete. Israelis of all stripes know now that much of the Western media is their enemy. Thank the Lord the media are so inept!

But this change in Israel has been brewing for years. My friend was deeply shaken by the increase in anti-Semitism during the suicide bombing campaign, surely one of the most unambiguously evil actions in living memory. She was, as I stated, sickened by Western media coverage of the Gaza incursion, and is openly derisive of media collusion with the flotilla con-job. This change is big, it’s universal in Israel. The anti-Israel media have no idea which way the wind is blowing: Israel is onto them. They are Israel’s enemies. And they are known and will be treated as such.

I remarked in an earlier comment to you on something similar happening with the sexual abuse “crisis” ginned up by anti-Catholic media like the New York Times. All the Times succeeded in doing was revealing themselves as enemies of the Church. Catholics are onto them now … and they’ll never be able to really hurt the Church again. That’s good. And so is the media’s self-immolation on the flotilla con job. The bungling behind-the-times Times, BBC, Salon, the Daily Beast, Slate et al, have done it again. What a bunch of mindless useless incompetents they are.

So like you, I’m actually pretty cheerful about the flotilla story. Things are looking up!

LA replies:

Thank you for seeing this, and I agree with you that the media and the voices of official opinion throughout the world have now revealed themselves to be, not Israel’s critics, not Israel’s biased critics, but Israel’s enemies.
Dale F. writes:

Thanks for pointing out the detailed correspondences between the parody and the original.

Having largely ignored popular music from the mid-’70s on, I wasn’t sure who some of the original musicians were. Particularly intriguing to me was the gravelly-voiced growling fellow who appears in the parody video at 2:15; he seems to be a satirical take on Colonel Qaddafi. At 2:15 in the original, it’s Bruce Springsteen. Nice!

LA writes:

Here is a longer version of the video, showing it as part of a broadcast of Latma, a satirical TV station and website.


Posted by Lawrence Auster at June 05, 2010 07:30 PM | Send
    

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