How “Baby It’s Cold Outside” May Be Out in the Cold

[Brad]

Hope this is not considered political. If so, I have no issue with it being deleted. 

How ‘Baby, It’s Cold Outside’ Went From Parlor Act to Problematic

[GA Russell]

I'm as politically incorrect as anyone else below the Mason-Dixon line, but I've long felt that the lyrics here are creepy.  I don't think that the feminism of the past fifty years has anything to do with it.

[Kevin Bresnahan]

There are a couple of lines that really aren't right. "Hey, what's in this drink?" being the worst.

[danasgoodstuff]

https://variety.com/2018/music/news/baby-its-cold-outside-song-war-1203080834/ 

a different perspective

[sonnymax]

16 minutes ago, Kevin Bresnahan said:

There are a couple of lines that really aren't right. "Hey, what's in this drink?" being the worst.

Relax. It was 1944. It's called alcohol. 

[Brad]

I think we've lost perspective on some things. You can't always view everything through today's prism. 

[Dave James]

I'm pretty sure that when Frank Loesser wrote this song in 1944, he could not have imagined this discussion. This a period piece from a time and a place that, sadly, no longer exists.  To impugn it seven decades later by holding it up to the light cast by today's social mores is wrong. 

Edited December 16, 2018 by Dave James

[Teasing the Korean]

The beauty of literature is that we can interpret what we read however we want.  

However, we can't force everyone else to agree with our interpretations.  Nor should we try.  IMO.  

Edited December 16, 2018 by Teasing the Korean

[Scott Dolan]

All this hoopla over a song that really isn’t very good to begin with. 

[Big Beat Steve]

4 hours ago, Dave James said:

I'm pretty sure that when Frank Loesser wrote this song in 1944, he could not have imagined this discussion. This a period piece from a time and a place that, sadly, no longer exists.  To impugn it seven decades later by holding it up to the light cast by today's social mores is wrong. 

Exactly.

And off-target (because the context was all different).

If anybody wants to debate on song lyrics that are doubtful in a context like this then the check this by Austrian singer Falco from the 80s (may draw a blank with US music listeners but launched a big debate on several occasions, and again in more recent times, vaguely linked to the metoo debate):

This English-language description sums up the gist of the debate:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeanny_(song)

BTW, what's all the fuss about anyway? How many blues and country tunes are there out there that openly talk about just shooting one's woman? Or of other stuff you would not get away with in your lyrics on today's market? Off the radar of the morally zealous because those niche musics are off THEIR radar? Or should we indeed imagine that for once they realized those lyrics need to be seen in the context of their times?

Or how abut screening rap lyrics for P.C.? Or do they get a free pass each time because it's rap? German-language forumists may remember the (quite understandable) outrage caused by the award-winning (!) lyrics of German-language rappers Kollegah & Farid Bang a couple of months ago. And this was TODAY!

 

 

 

[soulpope]

9 minutes ago, Big Beat Steve said:

Exactly.

And off-target (because the context was all different).

If anybody wants to debate on song lyrics that are doubtful in a context like this then the check this by Austrian singer Falco from the 80s (may draw a blank with US music listeners but launched a big debate on several occasions, and again in more recent times, vaguely linked to the metoo debate):

This English-language description sums up the gist of the debate:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeanny_(song)

Sort of delibarate provocation by Falco at that time ....

[Big Beat Steve]

6 minutes ago, soulpope said:

Sort of delibarate provocation by Falco at that time ....

Of course, but you know how people jump(ed) on it.

Generally speaking, though, I doubt this would be an excuse in EVERY case. Even if you aren't one of out-and-out moral zealots.

The song was of doubtful content in a way at the time but sensible people just shrugged it off. But imagine the hell that would break loose if someone did a NEW song like this today. And strangely enough there are enough who see fit to play the morally outraged today.

By comparison, lyrics-wise that 1944 ditty is just lame and harmless. BTW, Soulpope, remember the German-language cover versions of the song that abounded in 1949/50 saw re-recordings by other artists in 1965, 1973, 1978 and 1990?

 

[soulpope]

6 minutes ago, Big Beat Steve said:

Of course, but you know how people jump(ed) on it.

Creating unconsciously (at that time) invaluable marketing (similar to "Je t'aime" by Gainsbourg+Birkin) .... 

Edited December 16, 2018 by soulpope

[Big Beat Steve]

1 hour ago, soulpope said:

Creating unconsciously (at that time) invaluable marketing (similar to "Je t'aime" by Gainsbourg+Birkin) .... 

Yeah, that's another one, you're right. Did the French metooer(ess)es jump on that one already, I wonder?

You know this debate is gaining momentum in bizarre ways these days. DId you hear about the following? Coincidental with the "Baby it's cold outside" fuss (that DID make some headlines in music news here too), the other day I read a report how that German 90s girlie singer who recorded under the band name of Lucilectric now saw fit to distance herself from her hit of some 25 years ago "Weil ich ein Mädchen bin " (Because I am a girl) that she found to be sooo inapproriate today in the way it portrayed the role of women. Despite the fact that the lyrics culminate in something like '"No matter what the men do, I'll win in the end because I'm a girl" and despite the fact that the roles described there are still being adopted by many, many out there without being forced to do so. Bedsides, I doubt even at that time many listeners to THAT kind of song did NOT take it with grain of amused salt. Nothing but an attempt at making it into the headlines IMO by some one-hit wonder flash in the pan who has long since moved into other fields on the other side of the mike so ought to be above this. The only thing she ought to be ashamed of is the utter silliness of the entire song, arrangements and vocals as such.

Regardless ... as for the starting point, this quote form the starting link nails it IMO.

“Do we get to a point where human worth, warmth and romance are illegal?” the conservative commentator Tucker Carlson argued on Fox News. (never mind whether Fox or "conservative" might discredit the statement with some)

A lot of this kind of songs is about romance and seduction and winning over (which can and does work both ways) without ever going into rape. How many, many such winning-over romance situations are there out there between the sexes for any single rape situation? What point throwing out the baby with the bathwater just because of some moral outrage that claims to be entitled to speak for EVERYBODY?

I must admit, though, I was not aware this song, apart from its (likely) winter connotations, had become a typical Christmas song in some necks of the woods.

Now if anybody wants to get all enraged at this time of year, let's just sit back and wait until someone out there insists on blacklisting Chris Rea's "Driving Home for Christmas" for deliberately advocating burning the dwindling resources of this planet through some long-distance driving around just like like that at THIS time of year?? Won't happen? Wait and see and mark my words until the pendulum swings THAT way ...

Edited December 16, 2018 by Big Beat Steve

[soulpope]

10 minutes ago, Big Beat Steve said:

Yeah, that's another one, you're right. Did the French metooer(ess)es jump on that one already, I wonder?

You know this debate is gaining momentum in bizarre ways these days. DId you hear about the following? Coinidental with the "Baby it's cold outside" fuss (that DID make some headlines in music news here too), the other day I read a report how that German 90s girlie singer who recorded under the band name of Lucilectric now saw fit to distance herself from her hit of some 25 years ago "Weil ich ein Mädchen bin " (Because I am a girl) that she found to be sooo inapproriate today in the way it portrayed the role of women. Despite the fact that the lyrics culminate in something like '"No matter what the men do, I'll win in the end because I'm a girl" and despite the fact that the roles described there are still being adopted by many, many out there without being forced to do so. Bedsides, I doubt even at that time many listeners to THAT kind of song did NOT take it with grain of amused salt. Nothing but an attempt at making it into the headlines IMO by some one-hit wonder flash in the pan who has long since moved into other fields on the other side of the mike so ought to be above this. The only thing she ought to be ashamed of is the utter silliness of the entire song, arrangements and vocals as such.

Spot on ....

[Dan Gould]

10 hours ago, sonnymax said:

Relax. It was 1944. It's called alcohol. 

Precisely.

Did anyone click thru to the Funny or Die video?

I don't think the song should be banned, but I was totally enjoying the video, until that thudding, awful, appalling end.

"I'm ______ reminding you this is a completely inappropriate song."

Comes thru like the shovel to the dude's head.  Subtlety is not exactly the PC crowd's forte now is it?

They could have have said "I'm _________ to remind you boys that 'no means no' and if you don't get it, you might get a shovel to the head."

But no: "If you didn't get the message from our silly video, I'm here to remind you that song is completely inappropriate."  

Made me want to watch the video again and root for the guy this time.

[JSngry]

Ok, so it certainly could be a date-rape song. And yes, that is horrible and does need a shovel to the head.

But, in other, more sexually mature/aware hands (or voices), it is a wonderfully coy comment on mutually agreeable seduction and the games that get played on the way to "yes" - a mutually agreeable yes.

Well, maybe just a cigarette more...

[Kevin Bresnahan]

16 hours ago, sonnymax said:

Relax. It was 1944. It's called alcohol. 

When I started at work in 1985, the machine shop at Raytheon had a Playboy calendar on the wall, dirty jokes were common and sexual innuendo was "the norm".

It's not 1944 nor is it 1985.

While I still enjoy this song and understand it in context, in today's world, it's just not kosher.

[mjzee]

Reread "1984."  This is all about dropping history down the memory hole.

[JSngry]

13 minutes ago, mjzee said:

Reread "1984."  This is all about dropping history down the memory hole.

Nah, I think it's about making the memory hole bigger. Nothing wrong with that.

[Teasing the Korean]

1 hour ago, mjzee said:

Reread "1984."  This is all about dropping history down the memory hole.

Keep your history out of my memory hole unless you have my consent.

[felser]

It's a creepy song.  There are much, much creepier songs, like the ones from Emanem about chopping up his wife and going with his daughter to throw her remains in the ocean, or "Timothy" by the Buoy's about eating the poor guy.  Don't need to ban a song like "Baby. It's Cold Outside", but don't need to choose to play/listen to it, either.   Me, I would have banned the Emanem songs, but understand why others wouldn't due to first amendment rights.  For that matter, I lived in Huntsville, Alabama in 1965, and the stations there banned "Eve of Destruction", likely for the lines "Think of the hate there is in Red China, then take a look around to Selma, Alabama". #1 song in the nation, and I never knew it existed until I heard it when visiting relatives in Pittsburgh.

[Brad]

1 hour ago, Kevin Bresnahan said:

When I started at work in 1985, the machine shop at Raytheon had a Playboy calendar on the wall, dirty jokes were common and sexual innuendo was "the norm".

It's not 1944 nor is it 1985.

While I still enjoy this song and understand it in context, in today's world, it's just not kosher.

Everything can’t be judged by today’s mores.  I think we make a mistake when we do that. 

[Kevin Bresnahan]

1 minute ago, Brad said:

Everything can’t be judged by today’s mores.  I think we make a mistake when we do that. 

True, but we do need to be a way more understanding that others might not appreciate it, nor do we need to celebrate it. How do you think a lot of the "Me Too" women feel about that song? It seems like almost every Christmas CD today has a version of "Baby It's Cold Outside". As I said earlier, "Say, what's in this drink," with what just happened to Bill Cosby, is probably upsetting to any woman who has really been roofied.

[JSngry]

37 minutes ago, Kevin Bresnahan said:

 As I said earlier, "Say, what's in this drink," with what just happened to Bill Cosby, is probably upsetting to any woman who has really been roofied.

An objective, historically aware reading of that lyric would allow for it just being an indication that the drink was stronger than expected, and she didn't put it down or throw it out, but instead kept sipping and flirting.

But you're right, in today's environment, there's another and quite different lens to see that through, and I say that should be respected.

But here's a radical notion - why don't we have a discussion about how flirting is disappearing as a valid method of initiating a relationship, and why is that? Maybe it's the decades of free porn making men feel entitled and women feel obligated, and oh yeah, what could possible go wrong with that as it imprints itself across several generations? What could possibly go wrong?

We'll not have that conversation anytime soon, will we? We're too far gone.