User:Dexter's Mom/sandbox/randomness

==It's 2022. You know what this means, right? It means that "Complicated" was released 20 years ago. As you’ve probably heard, 2022 marks Avril Lavigne's 20th anniversary as a recording artist. All I have to say is that this is unfortunate. So unfortunate and embarassing. After all, Avril is the opposite of what she should've been—a one-hit wonder, but she's not one by any means. Something is seriously still wrong with her 20 years later.==

While her debut album, Let Go, came out in June of 2002, her first introduction took place exactly 20 years ago—in 2002—with the release of her debut single, “Complicated”. Avril now calls it “the most important song” of her career”. “It’s so extremely special, and as the years have gone on, it’s become even more meaningful to me, just with that being my first single,” Avril tells ABC Audio. “I wrote it when I was 16 with Lauren Christy. I put it out when I was 17.” “It was my first song and it was the first video. It was on the radio, it was a huge hit and, like, launched my career,” Avril adds. “So it’s, like, in a way... the most important song, too.” On all her tours, Avril has definitely been singing that song, as well as a good chunk of her new album Love Sux.

Pop: It's Your Decision - A Rant and Rebel on Pop Music, Posers and Scene Kids
You’re out for the first time in a while and it’s 1:13 AM, but if any pop songs are playing at that time, you probably know all of the words and want to scream them at me while wishing to have everyone around you be your best friend. You won’t remember any of this tomorrow, especially if in 99% of all cases you don’t like their songs. I don’t either. It happened this time. Pop artists like Avril Lavigne with “Complicated”, Miley Cyrus with “Party in the USA”, Christina Aguilera with “Genie in a Bottle”, Black Eyed Peas with “I Gotta Feeling”, Blink-182 with “All the Small Things”, Justin Timberlake with “Can’t Stop the Feeling”, Jennifer Lopez with “Jenny from the Block”, Simple Plan with “I’d Do Anything”, the Click Five with “Just the Girl”, Jonas with “S.O.S.” and/or Britney Spears with “Baby One More Time” did this to you.

I absolutely detest ABBA, LMFAO, the Counting Crows, Aerosmith, Jewel, Matchbox Twenty, ZZ Top, Bachman-Turner Overdrive, Meat Loaf, Scorpions, Roxette, Shania Twain, Gummibär, Sonic Youth, Incubus, Maroon 5, Cyndi Lauper, Staind, Black Eyed Peas, Axl Rose, Brian Johnson, Miley Cyrus, devoid-of-emotion ballad manufacturers like Michael Bolton, Phil Collins, Rod Stewart, Dionne Warwick and Keane, high-pitched screaming by pop sirens like Alicia Keys, Anastacia, Mary J. Blige, Celine Dion, Whitney Houston and Mariah Carey, Train, BTS, Three Days Grace, Bush, Puddle of Mudd, Theory of a Deadman, Creed, Lifehouse, Hoobastank, Cobra Starship, Chicago, Smash Mouth, Garbage, Gin Blossoms, Boston, Foreigner, Styx, Jeff Rosenstock, Billie Eillish, Evanescence, Hatsune Miku, Bomb the Music Industry!, Lionel Richie, the Jonas Brothers, TLC, fake "gangsters" like Lil’ Wayne, P. Diddy, 50 Cent, Eminem and Nicki Minaj, one or two-hit wonders and cheesy Eurodance devoid of real value like Michael Sembello, scene kids like Blood on the Dance Floor and IWABO, Toni Basil, Daniel Powter, A*Teens, Cascades, Calling, Corrs, Exile, Player, O-Zone, Eiffel 65, Aqua, Westlife, Information Society, Silver, Monotones, Baby Kata, Nutty Squirrels, Fast Food Rockers, Rickie Lee Jones, Caramell, Cartoons, Vanessa Carlton and Lisa Marie Presley, the Outfield, Michelle Branch, Mumford and Sons, Seals and Crofts, Kenny Loggins, spoilt little, kawaii “rock/punk chicks” like Skye Sweetnam, Lindsay Lohan, Avril Lavigne, Demi Lovato and Pink, primitive truck drivers’ blue-collar rock like Black Crowes, Bruce Springsteen, John Mellencamp and Bryan Adams, ugly neo-Americana rock a la Nickelback, sleepy pop-for-comatose-yuppies a la Dido, Carpenters, Helen Reddy and Norah Jones, laughable baby punk like Good Charlotte, Sum 41, Blink-182, Bowling For Soup, Simple Plan, All-American Rejects and the Ataris, pompous, campy, blatantly '80s, corny, theatrical, hedonistic, synthesized, cheesy, fake, over-dramatic dad rock with similar-sounding instrumentation like Journey, 38 Special, REO Speedwagon, RATT, Def Leppard, Sammy Hagar, Mötley Crüe, Poison, Warrant, Winger, Bon Jovi, Bad English, L.A. Guns, Warrant, Dokken, Damn Yankees, Great White, Whitesnake, FireHouse and Europe, Hootie and the Blowfish, the Housemartins, Britney Spears, Taylor Swift, Madonna, Christina Aguilera, Lady Gaga, Beyoncé, Spice Girls, Icona Pop, Gwen Stefani, the Jackson 5, brats who can’t sing and are still/were formerly too young to be making music like Jojo Siwa, Celine Tam, Jackie Evancho, Stevie Brock, Angelina Jordan, and Charlotte Church, more pointless one and two-hit wonders like Elvin Bishop, Jars of Clay, Krystal Meyers, Jimmy Boyd, Elmo and Patsy and Benny Bell, childish, bubblegum, corny ‘60s pop like the Archies and the 1910 Fruit Company, Bruno Mars, atonal nu metal and boy band metal like Linkin Park, POD, Bullet For My Valentine and Slipknot, dullards like Michael Buble, Jason Mraz, Gary Moore, Simply Red, James Blunt and Bob Seger, Michael Peterson, Uncle Kracker, Carrie Underwood, Rascal Flatts, Lady A, Hank Williams, George Strait, Alan Jackson, the Chicks, the Go-Go's...

And any other trash ejected in very large quantities into the mainstream media by talentless charlatans. Around 95% of the buying public are familiar with these. I'm not part of the buying public, nor will I ever be.

Avril Lavigne is the one of the worst flash-in-the-pans of the pop punk era and so is Pink, as both are spoiled little "punk" brats. They're not the worst, but they come so close. I’ll admit, though, Simple Plan and Yellowcard are way worse. I say that because this isn’t about the deep emo cuts, and I say that because I don’t mean they’re anything but punk. Their music is NOT PUNK as in IT'S NOT EVEN CLOSE AND IT'S JUST POP. These two represent the most embarrassing attempts to clone punk rock out there.

Because I have such an attitude, I can blow up in anger all I want to. I’ve talked and talked to my friends about music... but it just goes out one ear and out the other. I’ve talked about pop, how awful it is, how Avril Lavigne and Sum 41 ruined punk, why Auto Tune/pitch correction should stop being used, and that authenticity is important. No matter what, it barely seems to faze them. I talked to myself one day. By the time I reached teenhood, my new attitude became apparent. I suppose that was the beginning of it. I used to never pay attention to what I listened to. I was still a fan of rock, but not as big of a rock fan as I am now. I heard it everywhere. I could use the same argument for why soap operas are bad as I could for why pop is bad. Whether or not I realize it, I must get across the point that I mean business.

I am provoked to wrath, anger and rebellion, so what do I do to correct my problem—the problem being that pop has everything that makes it bad and does a lot to drive me up the wall? I correct the problem using anger. I hate to listen to most pop like Pink, Britney Spears, Taylor Swift, Miley Cyrus, Katy Perry, Maroon 5, Rihanna, Beyonce, Avril Lavigne, Rihanna, Mariah Carey, Whitney Houston (R.I.P.), Hilary Duff, the Jonas Brothers and the Black Eyed Peas. Seriously, the more rock music gets tackled, the more I have to rebel. I identify music so closely that if I attack pop, it’s a personal attack on me. I can criticize pop all I want to. It's all fake. Pop is just as bad as country, perhaps even worse. Some pop music like electropop and J-pop is just as loud as rock, perhaps even louder than rock. Pop isn’t even supposed to be loud and noisy, yet some of it is. I must plead ignorance. Seriously, I can set standards in the home I live in. I can also set good standards for teenagers—both male and female. Any teen girls who haven’t been set good standards are most likely teeny boppers, though some boys are little teeny boppers too. That means they follow the latest trends in pop culture and are incredibly materialistic and spoiled. They squeal and giggle so much, and brag about their boyfriends at lunchtime in school.

They listen to and are often associated with such trash music and horrible scenes as:

Primary

 * Alternative R&B
 * Dance
 * Alternative dance
 * Grebo
 * New rave
 * Dance-pop
 * Bubblegum dance
 * Disco polo
 * Freestyle
 * EDM
 * Nu metal
 * Emo
 * Emo pop
 * Metalcore
 * Mathcore
 * Deathcore
 * Easycore
 * Electronicore
 * Melodic metalcore
 * Progressive metalcore
 * Nu metalcore
 * Nintendocore
 * Teen pop
 * J-pop
 * Pop punk
 * Post-grunge

Secondary

 * Eurodance
 * Electronica
 * Post-punk revival
 * Experimental
 * Avant-garde metal
 * Post-rock
 * Post-metal
 * Avant-pop
 * Biomusic
 * Deconstructed club
 * Krautrock
 * Math rock
 * Noise
 * No wave
 * Neofolk
 * Wave

They also think they are real teens, but they’re actually not. They try too hard to act like real teenagers or normal people. They dress in pink, purple, mini-skirts and T-shirts reading “pop princess” or “miss attitude” and other junk like that. They like typing like this: “l00k AnN I hAvE a NeW cElL!!! I kAn sLeEp OvEr yay!!! Like We CaN caLl up the B0iZ and pAiNt oUr naILz!!!” Teeny boppers are so annoying. They think they’re all that because they have “boyfriends”. They don't know the true definition of the word “boyfriend”, and their favorite hobby is shopping.

Because I don’t ever watch soap operas or reality shows on television, someone could scripturally come up with the same arguments for why soap operas are bad as I could for why pop music is bad. Whether or not parents may realize it, teens watch them very closely. They shouldn’t. Their parents should be watching them. Being a consistent example for their child will ease attention if that's what the parents think will happen. Pop music is one of the most difficult things a young person must deal with. I’d rather lecture potential teeny boppers, unless that turns them off immediately, than not. I can get teen girls who aren’t like that yet into considering their own personal decision concerning pop or music scenes like the ones mentioned above. I want to find out what's bothering them. Parents should convict their children about acting up at home and start in again about their music if those teens decide to straighten things out. Their children should obey them, but it’s hard. On one side, they want to be obedient, then on the other side they seem to get so sidetracked.

A.) The lyrics must not glorify sex, drugs, partying, cars, money and/or alcohol, b.) the lyrics and the music must not be for teeny boppers or designed to pander to them, and if so they must be subtle and indirect rather than on-the-nose and whiny, c.) the music must be as non-commercial and authentic as possible, and d.) I would like a mention of society, rebellion, sociopathy, politics, history, war, diseases, disabilities, mythology and/or legends or two in the songs.

While it’s not necessary for the lyrics to be meaningful, lyrics with something substantial to say helps someone know what’s in your heart. Mainstream music sucks because the lyrics are often not substantial and the artists/bands are often passionate about things they’ve had little to no time to experience. The music that overcompensates, the shallow words and the emotion are created by fans to croon a song for weeks.

Nickelback is probably the worst and most hated rock band of all time. Their lyrics glorify things that shouldn't be glorified. I will repeat the lyrics to “Rockstar” here, because I know them by heart:

It's like the bottom of the ninth, and I'm never gonna win  This life hasn't turned out quite the way I want it to be (Tell me what you want)  I want a brand new house on an episode of Cribs and a bathroom I can play baseball in and a king-size tub, big enough for ten plus me (Uh, so what you need?)  I'll need a credit card that's got no limit and a big black jet with a bedroom in it gonna join the mile high club at 37,000 feet (Been there, done that)  I want a new tour bus full of old guitars, my own star on Hollywood Boulevard, somewhere between Cher and James Dean is fine for me (So how you gonna do it?)  I'm gonna trade this life for fortune and fame, I'd even cut my hair and changed my name  'Cause we all just wanna be big rockstars and live in hilltop houses, driving 15 cars / Hey, hey, I wanna be a rockstar, hey, hey, I wanna be a rockstar 

There you have it, folks. This song is one of the worst things to ever exist. “Rockstar” by Nickelback revolves entirely around hedonism. The dance-pop group BEP is also an abominable pseudo-rap outfit. They took over the world and too much from it. What I just said can at least be something the group members don’t know already. No one is listening to Black Eyed Peas for meaningful lyrics. They want their bodies to rock all night long, so they put on a Black Eyed Peas song. That’s it. Still, it’s possible to produce an intelligent beat. That’s absurd.

Just because people want to rock their bodies all night long doesn’t mean the music has to be made solely for that purpose and that no effort whatsoever can be put into the melodies, the vocals, the production or the lyrics. If hedonism is all that matters to Nickelback and the Black Eyed Peas or every band/artist like them, then they’re stupid bands. Chad Kroeger is a spoiled manchild as much as his former wife Avril Lavigne is a spoiled womanchild. People with such thoughts or actions will listen to whatever lyrics because the song’s got “a good beat” or because “it’s catchy”. Lyrics should be poetic and people shouldn’t only care about the beat. I’m sorry if I said that, and it’s sad but it’s true. Most pop stars or pop rappers lip-sync, use repetitive electronic loops and barely write their own lyrics. We’ve also lost a lot of talented musicians like Kurt Cobain, Cliff Burton, Chris Cornell, the founding members of the Ramones and Randy Rhoads.

Honorable mentions: Joe Strummer of the Clash, Ronnie James Dio, Scott Weiland of Stone Temple Pilots, Layne Staley of Alice in Chains, David Bowie, Freddie Mercury of Queen, John Lennon and George Harrison of the Beatles, Prince, Michael Jackson, John Bonham of Led Zeppelin, Bon Scott of AC/DC, Sid Vicious of the Sex Pistols, Gordon Lewis of Teenage Head, Eddie Halen of Van Halen, Kevin DuBrow of Quiet Riot, Syd Barrett and Richard Wright of Pink Floyd, Stevie Ray Vaughan and Rick James. Rest in peace.

Dishonorable mention: Aaron Carter.

Avril Lavigne, AKA the Queen of Posers
Avril Lavigne is a pop idol and an icon of 2000s pop culture. She’s spoiled and loves Hot Topic when materialism, being spoiled and brattiness are absolutely nothing that matters in life. She thinks Hot Topic is the best store ever and so do her fans, but it’s actually a contrived identification and an anti-authoritarian identity with manufactured youth subcultures. Every Avril Lavigne album (especially Goodbye Lullaby and Avril Lavigne ‘13, her worst ones) seems to contain forced music rather than music made from a creative gestalt. Her songwriting is heavily artificial and her lyrics are horrible. I mean, “He was a boy, she was a girl, can I make it any more obvious”? “Somebody else ‘round everyone else”? “I have to pull my money out and that looks bad”? “And now you’re somewhere out there with a hey, hey, psycho babe / I hate you, why are guys so lame?” That’s just stupid!

Her fangirls are over obsessive and can’t take an opinion. No matter what you say about Avril Lavigne or how logical you sound, they aren’t gonna take your opinion. You know what? I’m tired of them. All they do is attack anybody who says otherwise. You what? I hate Avril Lavigne! But guess what? I have logical reasons why I can’t stand her! For one thing, her music is pop. I hate pop! I hate it more than country music, and that’s saying something right there! Also, while it’s pretty rare, you’re gonna hear her music if you go out shopping!

Do I want to hear “Complicated” or “Sk8er Boi” while I’m out and about? No, I don’t! Another thing that’s been bugging me is that you see her everywhere! She isn't even safe from being heard of or seen in movies like Over the Hedge, The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie (no, I'm seriously not kidding) and Fast Food Nation! You even see her on Hot Topic merchandise! Also, here’s a newsflash for you fangirls out there! The Beatles weren’t manufactured like Avril is! Deep Purple isn’t manufactured like her! Liz Phair isn’t manufactured like her! Nirvana wasn’t manufactured like her! Uriah Heep wasn’t manufactured like her! Steppenwolf wasn’t manufactured like her! Avril is just store-bought! If there were a button I could press that would eliminate “Complicated” or “I’m with You” from ever existing, I’d press that button 12 times. Just to be fair, not all modern music (pop or otherwise) is bad. I like Mastodon (metal), The Flaming Lips (alt-rock), Fiona Apple (art pop), the White Stripes (indie rock), the Erkonauts (metal) and Devin Townsend. Pure pop isn’t awesome. Avril Lavigne is pop, and more than half of her entire output is NOTHING BUT.

She’s not original! She’s not an original artist! She was formed by Shania Twain when she won a radio contest in 1999 to perform with her live! That’s not originality, folks! Oh, and marketing ploys! They formed her too! I can tell you right now, I know a lot more bands and artists out there who are ten times better than Avril Lavigne. She sucks and so do her fangirls. She is one of the worst artists known to mankind. Is she among the worst of the worst? No, but she comes close. She barely has any talent. The riffs provided by her guitarists in the songs are just three or four chords. OK, just like the same 3-4 chords. And the solos? Well, forget about the solos, and the chugging too! I mean, seriously, the difference between her guitarists’ skill and, like, Nirvana or Led Zeppelin’s skill is just very vast. Avril Lavigne apparently only seems to be liked because “she’s hot”. So, apparently, everyone just likes modern singers who have “hot” singing voices and “hot” looks all of a sudden. No, they’re not hot! They’re terrible!

One of Avril Lavigne’s worst and most infamous quotes is this: “I mean, the way she dresses... I’m not trying to dis anyone, but with me, the clothes I wear onstage are the clothes I would wear to school or go shopping. I’m not gonna go up onstage and dress different. Britney Spears goes up onstage and dresses like a showgirl. She’s not being herself up there because of the way she dances.” In reality, she doesn’t hate Britney Spears. She once called her a human being and wanted her to be left alone. "She’s a human being. God, leave her alone!" she said. More hypocrisy, eh?

Her music sucks and, for the most part, is not even rock or punk. It’s just stupid pop music! She claims she’s both rock and punk when she’s not, then she says “I’m not punk.” What a hypocrite! You want rock music? Listen to AC/DC, Van Halen, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, Elvis Presley or Deep Purple. You want punk? Listen to the Dead Kennedys, the Sex Pistols, Unwound, Bad Religion or Suicidal Tendencies. Without Shania Twain, Avril would’ve been nothing, showing how dependent she is to others. She is as dependent to others as much as the Jonas Brothers and Miley Cyrus were once dependent to Disney. Many people have and still listen to great bands with both fanboys and fangirls like the Beatles, Queen, Led Zeppelin, the Who, Metallica, Deep Purple, the White Stripes, the Hives and Judas Priest. Good music and bands like these were or have been around for 15-40 years. Avril is just a pop princess who was forgotten in, like, five years, but she has kept going to this day for one thing: To manipulate and control.

When you go around YouTube, you see that many of Avril’s fans have funny usernames. More often than not, they’ll defend their beloved Avril. Before anyone says “GET A LIFE!” to me, I have a life. It took me weeks to do this, and I’m not wasting energy. This is actually quite fun. Avril is only for these teenage and pre-teen fangirls who think they are punk and that she’s the same. She is the queen of posers, and so are the little teeny boppers listening to her. The only people who think she’s punk are them. No one else. They are the posers who like to hang out at the mall, are fashion obsessed 24/7 and think Hot Topic, Gucci, Macy’s (to a lesser extent) and Walmart (also to a lesser extent) are the best stores ever. While this doesn’t necessarily apply to her music and mostly applies to her as a person, she is not tough, rebellious, strong, anti-corporate or independent like she thinks she is. Why, if Avril Lavigne were tough, rebellious, strong, anti-corporate or independent then she would have to actually try.

Either that, or she would need be diverse and not pretend she was diverse, as punk is about diversity and an array of ideologies, expression, visual art, dance and literature. Punk music is largely characterized by anti-establishment and anti-corporatism views, and yet Avril has none nor is she independent. As you probably guessed, she is about as punk as and pretty much just Britney Spears, a poppy puppet to the evil major labels and the definition of trash pop. Both are major establishments, and they even try to defend each other. Punk promotes individual freedom and DIY ethics. Avril can’t do anything on her own as a Canadian “punk pop” singer and is far more controlled than free or able to “do it herself”; in fact, she's as controlled by corporate greed as much as Britney Spears is.

Punk is made up of beliefs like non-conformity, yet Avril is a huge conformist. It’s like she changed her behavior and beliefs to fit in with the punk crowd, to pander to scene kids and posers or because of her bad influences, whether it was the media that influenced her or not. This artist sucks. Normative conformity, conformity that occurs the desire to be liked and accepted, seems to be an even bigger problem with Avril. She wants to be liked and accepted; whenever she finds out that someone doesn’t like her or her music, she’ll cry and act spoiled. She’ll go ballistic. Her “totally punk” appearance, which she has changed over the years, has led to normal conformity and an increase in the exclusion of more diverse, less similar musical and physical images.

Avril Lavigne suffers from what is called “Barbie Syndrome” or “the Barbie Effect”. This refers to the popular doll Barbie having an unnatural figure, relying on others rather than having her own occupation or “doing it herself” and the prioritization of her physical appearance. Avril’s case of Barbie Syndrome further proves that she is not punk, is not anything close to being punk, is a poser, has fans who are a bunch of posers and is only around for money. Much like Barbie, Avril just wears the clothes everyone else does. “Everyone is wearing punk clothes, so I must too!” she thinks. Nowadays, many inaccurate views exaggerate the frequency and acceptability of bad, anti-social and socially unconscious things. For example, selling out and consumerism are viewed as good, as OK or as normal when they’re obviously not. Avril’s just a girl and I’m just a boy. Can I make it any more obvious?

Consumerism and commercial media tend not to lead to higher levels of we have commercial, manufactured, mainstream trash like like pop music, reality shows and soap operas like Days of Our Lives, Keeping Up with the Kardashians, the Real World, Ridiculousness, General Hospital, Here Comes Honey Boo Boo, teen sitcoms on Disney Channel and Nickelodeon like Hannah Montana, Shake It Up, Sonny with a Chance, Henry Danger and Bizaardvark, cheap, low-brow romance and comedy movies like Movie 43, Desperados, Legally Blonde, Teen Beach Movie, etc.