Fred Flintstone Can’t Be Happy About This

Recently we discussed the lyrics to Tik Tok by Kesha after one of my kids was doing a sing-a-long in the car with her friends. They sang every painful word. Before I leave, brush my teeth with a bottle of Jack…

But I’ll tell you what’s even more painful. A group of 7-9 year old children singing, Call me Mr. Flintstone, I can make your bed rock. Dis. Turb. Ing.

Try writing a column with that song stuck in your head.

By Merritt Patterson Mar. 31, 2010 | 8:38 am | 14 Comments | Comments RSS
14 comments to "Fred Flintstone Can't Be Happy About This"
  1. joey t @ March 31, 2010 at 8:52 am
    Hate that one!

  2. Shanna @ March 31, 2010 at 8:57 am
    You better hurry and switch radio stations before the kids start singing the newest Kesha song! How ’bout the family friendly station…KLTY… Super Glue earmuffs over their ears! Quick! Hurry Merritt!!!!!

  3. MK @ March 31, 2010 at 8:58 am
    Totally agree! My kid chirps along with this and even worse, she totally gets the meaning since she’s in 6th grade and knows about the birds and the bees. Luckily, she hasn’t figured out what Britney Spears’ song “3″ is about yet. She did ask, “why is it more fun with Peter, Paul and Mary?” I told her they were a folk group from the 60s that Britney had a deep and abiding respect for.

  4. Grace @ March 31, 2010 at 9:23 am
    That is scary–why can’t songs leave that stuff out.

    We were at a 4th grade party at Coffee Park this fall. The kids were singing along to “I kissed a Girl”, and lots of other songs that were not appropriate–AT ALL. The DJ didn’t seem to think anything about all the songs he played.

  5. Kersten Rettig @ March 31, 2010 at 9:27 am
    First Tiger. Then Jesse James. Now Fred Flinstone’s “prowess” is on display. Where are the values anymore?

  6. matt @ March 31, 2010 at 11:29 am
    I always fancied myself more of a Mr. Slate, sans that short sleeve shirt and tie pairing (i’m not a male teacher).

    Wilma never did much for me but I think we all know that Betty Rubble was a closet freak.

  7. bdad @ March 31, 2010 at 1:04 pm
    A week ago, I came home and my elementary-age daughter was looking at youtube to listen to Kesha. The night before, I saw this train wreck girl for the first time on American Idol singing something called “blah, blah, blah”. I had already seen the lyrics of tic/tok from Merritt’s previous post. When I told my daughter that Kesha did not represent good music, my daughter told me that I didn’t understand and that I was too old (everyone reading this, please raise your hand if you have been on either side of this discussion).

    Here’s what I did, FWIW, and amazingly it seems to have worked.

    We went to the DVR, where I still had AI from the night before, which had featured Kesha and Orianthi. She watched Orianthi, just spell-bound by her guitar playing. If you don’t know Orianthi, she’s an amazing guitar player, 24-year old Aussie, who can match chops with Carlos Santana.

    We then fast forwarded to Kesha. After playing that, I stopped, and my daughter commented: “that was horrible”.

    I promised to help her learn anything that she wants about music, so that she can discern “good” and “bad” music. It’s only a week later, but so far so good.

    Again, FWIW……

  8. Re: Fred Flintstone Can’t Be Happy About This « Park Cities People @ March 31, 2010 at 2:03 pm
    [...] a Highland Park High School student in reponse to my Mr. Flintstone post this morning. Merritt, Didn’t you listen to music your parents didn’t approve of? I’m sure you [...]

  9. bc @ March 31, 2010 at 2:35 pm
    There’s such a thing as good music with edgy themes & lyrics, but with the newer, popular music, the booze/sex lyrics are just covering up for lack of talent.

    I wish I had grown up with parents who appreciated great music (old and new). I had to discover it on my own. Every time I read an interview with a talented artist who cites early influences as the old blues/rock/folk albums his/her parents played in the house, I immediately think of my wife playing Kiss FM with my future kids in the back seat. [Shudder].

    I hope I have cool indie rock kids who make fun of the Kesha kids… I blame the parents. [Kidding...sort of].

  10. SDM @ March 31, 2010 at 3:30 pm
    It is pretty crazy what’s “acceptable” for radio airplay, I’ve been wondering what the next song blogged about would be. I was thinking this or blah, blah, blah (Don’t be a little bitch with your chit chat. Just show me where your dick’s at……Boy, come on give me rock stuff. Come put a little love it my glove bag. I wanna dance with no pants on. Meet me in the back with the jack and the jukebox. So cut to the chase kid.
    ‘Cause I know you don’t care what my middle name is.
    I wanna be naked but you’re wasted).

    Rihanna’s Rude Boy can’t be far behind. If you let your kids listen to the radio or watch videos then you won’t be able to escape this.

    Come here rude boy, boy
    Can you get it up
    Come here rude boy, boy
    Is you big enough
    Take it, take it
    Baby, baby
    Take it, take it
    Love me, love me

    Tonight
    I’mma give it to you harder
    Tonight
    I’mma turn your body out
    Relax
    Let me do it how I wanna
    If you got it
    I need it
    And I’mma put it down

    Buckle up
    I’mma give it to you stronger
    Hands up
    We can go a little longer
    Tonight
    I’mma get a little crazy
    Get a little crazy, baby

  11. MK @ March 31, 2010 at 8:31 pm
    OMG, the Rihanna song is off-the-chain vulgar and my child sings it ALL the time!! I don’t think she understands the part about “getting it up”, but she has certainly figured out that it’s a nasty song. Her dad and I about died when we heard it last week, driving to New Orleans over spring break. She’s singing these lyrics and we were like, “what do we do???” We decided not to say anything right then because then she would start asking, “but what does it mean? why is it bad?” and we were too beat down by the drive to be beat down by her questions, lol.

  12. 80's child @ March 31, 2010 at 9:28 pm
    I knew every word to Madonna’s Like A Virgin when I was in 2nd grade and I turned out alright.

  13. TrailTrekker @ April 1, 2010 at 8:14 am
    I wonder if my parents though the same, when I was 5, singing “Stroke” by Billy Squier.
    Is it a level of descentisization? and What is inappropriate these days?

  14. a mom @ April 1, 2010 at 9:02 am
    Caught my son repeating TO A GIRL lyrics from a very vulgar SNL song he had seen on youtube. DIS.GUST.ING. I was mortified. He thought it was funny and that it was a “generational” thing that people used to not talk about in my generation but now it’s okay to say as evidenced by the SNL skits/songs and songs on the radio. We have had several looong talks about this, and respect and what’s appropriate and inappropriate. I know I used to listen to songs with inappropriate lyrics and I turned out fine, but….

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