Explaining the “F-word” to your kid.

Unless you aren’t paying attention you probably saw this little piece about the city taking complaints over Saturday Night’s Rise Above Fest on the Bangor Waterfront. And unless you’re deaf, you probably heard it. You probably felt the bass rattle your windows, the explosions scare your dogs and you were probably reluctant to sleep with your bedroom windows cracked open.

As of now over 350 people have commented on the story published by the BDN, and hundreds more have taken to social media to complain. Sadly, none of these people matter.

The ones that matter are the 124 Bangor-area residents that called and complained about the noise. They are the reason the city council has to dedicate time to this problem (which is not going away due to the 30 million dollars of economic impact the concerts have had on the area) and the reason the BDN article and social media pontificating occurred in the first place.

It was the first show of the Waterfront Concerts season, it was a metal show…and it was all day. People are going to complain, they will again next year and the year after.

Avenged Sevenfold kicking assPersonally I thought the show was loud… but that is because I was 50 feet from the stage. It was loud….and it was awesome!

My wife could hear it too, but she was a mile and a half away at home.

I am one of those people who loves that Bangor has built this concert mecca for Maine. The good far outweighs the bad and I think anyone who is even 5% practical would agree that this is fantastic for the region.

But that isn’t the focus of this post.

The focus is the F-word.

Rock acts tend to use some “colorful stage language”. Frankly, why wouldn’t they? The crowd cheers louder with every F-bomb that gets dropped.

Arguments for acts to “clean up their act” are futile at best. Sadly, if rules against profanity or “artistic expression” were written into concert contracts, we wouldn’t be getting the shows (and economic impact) that we are.

So, as a parent, I feel for those who live close to the waterfront and are worried about their kids being subjected to the vulgarity of these shows.

Eventually all kids will grow up and hear swear words and all parents should have an idea of how they want to handle this and turn it into a teaching experience. But I would imagine explaining a rock group who says F@#* every third word will have a tough time playing down its relevance in our society.

While I ‘m no saint and have already taught my son a few words I wish he wasn’t yelling at the dogs, I wouldn’t have wanted to try to explain the song “Drink, Drank, Drunk” from the  band Hellyeah on Saturday. I also would not have wanted to talk about anything Lil’ Wayne rapped last year.

So for those of you complaining just because you don’t like the noise; I’m sorry, I feel for you, but you are unfortunately the minority in what is a very successful movement for the city.

But I would like to hear from parent of young kids, and your thoughts on how to handle this situation, and what (if anything) could be done.

 

 

 

 

Pat Lemieux

About Pat Lemieux

Pat has it all, family, big old house, dogs, a young son and a quarter-life crisis. He blogs about trying to be who he has always been and be who he now needs to be. He enjoys 90's grunge metal, tasty local brews and the outdoors.