This week I’ve been hounded by a few friends to purchase a track by Delirious in order to get them to the top of the charts. This is in an effort to copy the successful social media campaign to get Rage Against The Machine’s Killing in the Name Of to the top of the Christmas charts. I object and I will not buy it. And this is why…
The RATM campaign came from a large group of people disgruntled at the way Simon Cowell and Pop Idol had taken over and commercialised the Christmas number one spot. I bought it, I supported it. In the words of Duke Special: “I don’t get those pop and idol shows; Everybody knows that the good things take a little longer.” It’s short term entertainment. I’ll grant that it is fun, but it is not art and it is not beauty. RATM summed up my feelings and made an astute point about our society.
The Delirious campaign isn’t responding to an astute observation about society. One of the motivations revealed at the campaign website FAQ is a frustration about having a song with swearwords at the top of the charts at Christmas “at a time when the focus should have been on peace”. I don’t get frustrated about swearwords so easily and I’d like to suggest that peace is a holistic value that Simon Cowell doesn’t demonstrate. Sometimes it is necessary to campaign in subversive ways in order to bring about a greater peace.
So what kind of message is the History Maker campaign going to make. The view from the campaigners and Christian friends with which I’ve spoken is twofold. They seem convinced that God might speak to people through this track at one of the most important times of the Christian Calendar. They also believe that it will show what Christians can do if they work together.
The song History Maker just isn’t very good for this purpose. Rather than identifying with universal human emotion and need, it’s full of evangelical imagery that only Christians that have been indoctrinated for the past ten years will be able to relate to. Somewhat ironically this makes it a bad tool for evangelism to the masses. If one was going to use an overt song such as this, it would be nice to talk about Jesus. Unlike RATM this song has not had critical acclaim, it just doesn’t relate to contemporary culture. Maybe the well known Amazing Grace would have been a better choice. It is an anthem that is sung both in churches and on the pitch.
One of the best examples of Christians working together to achieve something came to a head in 1833. William Wilberforce spent his life campaigning for the abolition of slavery. Whilst many groups argued against the abolition (using the bible I might add) he persevered and garnered enough support to push through one of the biggest positive social shifts in history. It took a long time. It wasn’t a short social media led campaign, it took decades of hard work. To quote Duke again: “Everybody knows the good things take a little longer”. Some people seem to have forgotten that. How does this impact people in poverty? How does it impact those who are suffering from injustice? The working together in this case won’t have any long lasting effect other than to add to the already hideously scarred image of Christians as seen by the secular world.
Secular society will correctly see this as a attempt to replicate the success of RATM at Christmas. Except it’s no longer an original idea, it’s not a critically acclaimed song and no astute point about society is being made. On balance it looks a little foolish.
So I urge you not to buy it.
I am one of those christian friends you talk about here, and I just have one comment to make in response to the Wilberforce point…all the money made on purchasing this song is going towards compassionart, which is a charity started up by Martin Smith (lead singer in Delirious?) to give aid to those living in poverty in other countries. What £1 from sales of this song could do for these people is huge.
Yes, the song may be cryptic to those who haven’t been to church, but surely that opens doors to talk about what the song is talking about? It opens the door to radio appearances where the name of Jesus can be shared.
And finally for now, the person who started this whole campaign obviously felt strongly from God that this would be an idea worth pursuing. If you read what he has written in his notes on the website about tomorrow, and how it is all for the glory of God, perhaps you might be less cynical? Who are we to determine in what ways God will or will not work?