That '85 CasioHelping young people to live true loveLove, affectivity and feelings: themes of the II Virtual Congress for Catholic EducatorsMusic is undoubtedly one of the elements that best reflects the desires and longings of a given culture. We have been expressing our feelings -of love and lack of love- through songs for centuries.
Looking at the lyrics of the melodies we listen to helps to understand the culture in which we live and to know what people -especially young people- carry in their hearts.
Postmodern music sings the great contradictions of the deconstructed love of our time. The lack of love is expressed in a stark way and shows our growing difficulty to love each other.
The individualistic technological culture in which we are immersed often prevents us from discovering the other and, even if it is not what our heart desires, we end up accepting ephemeral loves.
Deep down, we want to be the only one for each other, confesses Olivia Rodrigo in Happier. That's why it hurts so much to fall out of love, and we can't stand betrayal because it reminds us of our lack of commitment, as a scorned woman acknowledges. Shakira in her latest productions. In the end, there is nothing left to do but try to justify a life of solitude as in How to be lonely of Rita Ora.
There are those who desperately and absurdly sing that we love ourselves better, as Miley Cyrus does in Flowers.
There is also no shortage of songs that speak of a trash love that, like fast food, satisfies but does not fill.
The music ultimately reflects the wounds -sometimes deep- of the lack of love that, as a society, we carry in our hearts.
Fortunately, despite these heartbreaking experiences, and as a kind of vindication against the nihilism of this century, we continue to sing of the beauty that lies in the desire to love and be loved unconditionally and forever.
We listen to beautiful melodies of betrothal love such as the popular Perfect by Ed Sheeran. There is no shortage of songs that speak about the strength of a mother's or daughter's love, such as the Love songs to you o Oh mom by Rigoberta Bandini. There are also those on the authentic and selfless love of friends, in That which you give me by Jarabe de Palo.
They are hopeful signs that, although the circumstances, the ways of expressing what we feel are different, the human being is the same; and cries out, as always, to love and be loved. If only good music contributed to a greater extent to the cultural battle.
We urgently need new models of life to help us put back together the pieces of a deconstructed love.
Professor at the Faculty of Law of the International University of Catalonia and director of the Institute for Advanced Family Studies. She directs the Chair on Intergenerational Solidarity in the Family (IsFamily Santander Chair) and the Childcare and Family Policies Chair of the Joaquim Molins Figueras Foundation. She is also Vice-Dean of the Faculty of Law at UIC Barcelona.
