Protest songs and the power of music :

Music was always used as a form of power and it still is. In the 20th century, there was a period when music was particularly used as a form of power, it was in the 60's with the hippie rock movement. This movement started in the U.S when its younger population started to take a critical look at their country; the Vietnam war, segregation, mass consumption. Young people didn't want their country to be like that. Art and mainly music immediately started to be part of the movement with emblematic figures like the Beatles, Jimmy Hendrix and many more who sang what we call protest songs.

We are going to pick one of the most emblematic protest songs ever written, "Blowin' in the wind" by Bob Dylan.

How many roads must a man walk down
Before you call him a man?
How many seas must a white dove sail
Before she sleeps in the sand?
How many times must the cannon balls fly
Before they're forever banned?
The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind
The answer is blowin' in the wind

How many years can a mountain exist
Before it's washed to the sea?
How many years must some people exist
Before they're allowed to be free?
And how many times can a man turn his head
And pretend that he just doesn't see - the answer
The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind
The answer is blowin' in the wind

How many times can a man look up
Before he sees the sky?
How many ears must one person have
Before he can hear people cry?
And how many deaths will it take 'till he knows
That too many people have died?
The answer, my friends, is blowin' in the wind
The answer is blowin' in the wind
Oh, the answer, my friends, is blowin' in the wind
The answer is blowin' in the wind

 Bob Dylan was one of the most engaged singers from the 60's, he was not only a singer but also a poet, he indeed received the Nobel price for literature in 2016. "Blowin' in the wind" is a song from 1963 and grasps many subjects of the time but mostly the one of war.

Bob Dylan asks questions about war and other atrocities committed at the time, for example "how many ears must one person have before he can hear people cry", he wants to say that people don't see the atrocities lived and committed by the americans since two years in Vietnam, they don't hear "the cries". The first verse is about segregation "How many roads must a man walk down

Before you call him a man?", he surely talks about the civil rights marches that were done by the African-Americans to obtain their rights, to be called "man". In the chorus he says "the answer is blowing in the wind", he wants to say that the answers are just right in front of us, waiting for someone to grab them. 

 We can totally say this song is a form of power, we saw the power of death and the power of guns, well this song is a weapon itself. Bob Dylan uses his song lyrics to fight against guns and war. I don't think all these protest song didn't play a role at the time, young americans in Vietnam listened to this kind of music and it may have had an effect on their motivation to fight, and the consequence is that they lost war. Black people obtained their rights at that time and artists like Bob Dylan played a great role in that fight.

 I wanted to mention Joan Baez too, she was Bob Dylan's girlfriend for years and wrote many of his songs, I think myself that she was even more engaged then him, she participated to many humanitarian projects and she still acts for humanity today.

Post 9: The US gun culture

Brady campaign to prevent gun violence

The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence and the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence are affiliated American nonprofit organizations that advocate for gun control and against gun violence. It was founded in 1974, and named Brady campaign after James Jim Brady was permanently disabled as a result of Ronal Reagan assassination attempt of 1981.
This document is a poster from the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence for a Campaign they're running since 44 years. This version is from 2010 and it raises the controversial issue of gun violence, mainly in the U.S.
What first stands out of the poster is the image of a gun. We immediately see the stars and strikes of the American flag as their colors are red and blue. At the top of the image of the gun is a short text. The text starts and finishes with bigger letters. The first line says "In one year, guns murdered..." and it is followed by the example of a few country and the number of deaths by gun for each of them (Spain, Germany...).The bigger letters at the end of the short text say "god bless america". We can finally see the logo of the Brady campaign in the bottom left-hand of the poster.
This poster is probably aimed at the American people but also to the American government. The idea of the the poster is to compare the U.S with other northern countries such as Germany, Canada. These countries were taken on purpose and for a good reason; they're developed countries, and the poster indirectly asks the U.S to take them as a model. For example, Canada was chose certainly because it's a very close country to the U.S, not only geographically but also culturally and guns are illegal there, so the U.S don't need guns either.
"God bless america" is surely said ironically. It's an expression often said by American nationalists, precisely people who buy these guns and who claim that these gun laws don't affect on gun deaths and that on the contrary they serve for legitimate defense. But Americans wouldn't need to defend themselves if guns were illegal in the first place.
I find this cartoon very efficient and striking, it is well thought to compare the U.S with other developed countries, it uses americans' pride to reach the american people. It also uses irony, it is a good way to make fun of some people, also to make them feel guilty. 

Gun murder graph

This 2010 graph is from the UNODC. It is in fact composed of two column bar graphs.

First graph is the number of people that died of gun murder between the years 2004 and 2010, rated per 100 000 people. They classified the top 10 countries plus the United States from the most murderous one to the less. The first place is for Honduras with more or less 68 deaths, the last one (in the top 10) is for Brazil with 18 deaths. The US (which isn't in the top 10) is in the 26th place with more or less 4 deaths.

Second graph is the same graph but the countries of the top ten are from the most developed one to the less, according to their Human Development Index (HDI: composite statistic (composite index) of life expectancy, education, and per capita income indicators, used to rank countries into four tiers of human development). The most murderous developed country (not counting the US) is Switzerland with 0.8 deaths. The less murderous one is Japan with NO deaths! If we count the united states, it easily takes the first place with 3,2 deaths. 

These two graphs are in fact focused on the United states, they wan't us to compare the US with the other countries. The first graph basically says that in this rank, the US is put with less developed countries such Jamaica, Colombia and that the number of people murdered by a gun isn't very different from these countries. The second graph wants to compare the US with, this time, other developed country but unfortunately, the US is the most murderous countries of them all.

Two cartoons

Gun lobby and congress is a 2010 ten cartoon from startribune.com and drawn by Steve Sack. We can see the American congress (American flag), and two well-dressed people talking. One has a suitcase with written "congress" on it and the second one with "gun lobby" on it. The gun lobby guy gives a bag of money to the congress guy and says "now where were we before we were so rudely interrupted".

This cartoon wants of course two say that there is a lot of corruption in the US politics and that the gun lobby pays the congress for it not let laws on gun illegality pass. The blood on the stairs of the congress seems to come from the congress guy, which would mean he is indirectly a murderer, like the gun lobby guy.

Second amendment and NRA is 2013 cartoon from davegrandlud.com and drawn by the cartoonist Dave Grandlud. We can see two characters, an old statue of a revolutionary man and a soldier with lots of weapons standing on boxes of AMMO. This cartoon critisize the fact that the NRA link the American revolution with violence and weapon. They think heroes are people with weapons because founding fathers of the US did the revolution with violence but it was'nt the same type of violence, they were obliged to use it and they used it for peace and unity.