I think Dennis Prager has called Imagine the stupidest song ever.
Dennis writes: “Lennon’s utopia is our dystopia. A world without God to give people some certitude where all their suffering is not meaningless is a nightmare. A world without religion means a world without any systematic way of ennobling people. A world without countries is a world without the United States of America, and it is a world governed by the morally imbecilic United Nations, where mass murderers sit on its “human rights” councils. A world without heaven or hell is a world without any ultimate justice, where torturers and their victims have identical fates — oblivion. A world without possessions is a world in which some enormous state possesses everything, and the individual is reduced to the status of a serf.”
I love the song. I don’t agree with the lyrics, but I love where the song takes me emotionally when I hear it and that’s my primary way of judging music. Where does it take me?
I feel the same way about Michael Moore films. I disagree with him politically, but I’m entertained by what he does. I feel the same way about Leni Riefinstahl‘s Nazi propaganda film Triumph of the Will.
I guess I enjoy art without worrying about its moral upshot. I love the novel Lolita, for instance, and it’s hardly a moral tale. I’ve read it four times. The writing is amazing.
I love the movie Love Story. It contains the famous line, “Love means never having to say you’re sorry.”
Dennis Prager often condemns this line as horrible advice for relationships. I don’t take the line literally. The author of the line (Erich Segal) isn’t sure what it means. The line evokes a wondrous feeling for me and I think the line works in that story.
Imagine there’s no heaven
It’s easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people living for today
Imagine there’s no countries
It isn’t hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people living life in peace
You, you may say
I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one
I hope some day you’ll join us
And the world will be as one
Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people sharing all the world
You, you may say
I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one
I hope some day you’ll join us
And the world will live as one
