Does "Rock music is evil / of the devil" have racist roots? (lemmy.world)

submitted 11 months ago by PlanetOfOrd@lemmy.world to c/asklemmy@lemmy.world

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As a Christian most of the circles I'm around are pretty chill...no stone-cold fundamentalists. But I have been around people (and even had family members) who are 100% convinced that rock music is evil and will lead people to engage in witchcraft and draw pentagrams all over their home.

The root of the belief is that rock music uses drums, which are used by voodoo tribes in Africa to entrance people.

Along a different track of thinking, from where did rock music originate? Slaves. They created the guitar because slave-owners didn't allow them to make music with drums.

So then is "rock music is evil" sort of an echo of that attitude?

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[-] Anticorp@lemmy.ml 4 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

I had to sit through a poorly made documentary at church as a kid about how Star Wars was evil. Star Wars, which Lucas made to be as generic good vs evil as possible, was labeled as evil by my church. I can pinpoint that as one of the moments in childhood where I started becoming critical of the views of my church, and questioning the things they were telling me. Another key moment was when they had a young man go up to the podium and give his testimony. He talked all about how he was living a life of partying, rock-and-roll, and sex, and then found his way back to the church. I vividly remember thinking "well if that's an option, that's the road I'll take too! Sounds like fun!". My church did a lot of things like that which had the opposite effect they intended.

this post was submitted on 20 Dec 2023

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