Five Finger Death Punch is an alternative metal band that formed in 2005. Many people think that FFDP’s type of music is “bad for you” due to some of the choice of words, however their music has good meaning to it. I say this because most of their songs are about veterans who fought in war. Not only that but also FFDP’s merchandise shop is actually a fundraiser for veterans who suffer from PTSD. The lead singer Ivan L. Moody actually allows veterans and people who suffer from cancer to come up on stage at some of their performances by FFDP.
Not all metal is bad, sometimes Five Finger Death Punch have legit meanings to their songs that you just have to deep dive into. In FFDP their main song for the veterans is”Remember Everything” . This song talks about remembering all the pain, suffering, and any possible PTSD that could have been caused by fighting in the Wars. Another song is “A Little Bit Off Today ''. This song doesn't talk about veterans, however, it does talk about the unexpected events of COVID 19, for example, how they can’t perform or be less than six feet away from each other. In this song there's a certain set of lyrics that can be and eye-catching, “I had to say goodbye today to someone that I love” I think personally we can all relate to this, because I'm pretty sure we all had to say goodbye to at least one person this year.
I interviewed one teacher and the principal of Greenwood and I asked, “Do you think Five Finger Death Punch is healthy for our youth to listen to or not and why?”.
The principal, Mr. Wilson states that he's never listened to the band but by the name he thinks it's unhealthy for our youth.
Mr. Deitz claims that it is not healthy for our youth to listen to, if they do not have knowledge as to what the lyrics are referring to and what they're about.
Not only did I interview teachers, I interviewed two students as well and asked them, “Do you think Five Finger Death Punch is healthy for kids our age to listen to or not?”
Rocky Shuler says that they're not really a big FFDP fan but from the songs he’s aware of, they know that some youth (depending on age) can use the band as a coping mechanism. They also proclaim that there are some valid reasons that children 14-18 would listen to them. It really just depends on the kid, but he also made the statement that it may not be necessarily healthy if you just introduce the band to a young child.
Emily Hixson believes that it depends on how the youth are listening to it, she states that if it is being listened to for rhythm then it can be healthy, however if they listen to the words specifically, then it might not be as healthy.
With these interviews, my statement about the choice of words having an impact on how people view the band is proven correct. Almost everyone that I interviewed had an outlook about the choice of words as to why the band might not be healthy for our youth. At the same time, not all of these people exactly know who the band is and what they represent. For the most part they were just going off of what people have said about them, but also off of first impressions with the band. Coming from my own personal experience with the band and actually listening for meaning rather than the bad choice words in their songs, I personally agree with what Mr. Deitz had mentioned about if the child was in the right state of mind, as well as if the child itself actually knew about the true meaning of the songs. With that being said about my own personal opinion, I would let my child listen to Five Finger Death Punch as long as they don't affect their own personal anger management with the songs they choose to listen to.
I would tell someone to really dive in to see what a band or song can mean, before they go ahead and say that since the band uses vulgar words then they are clearly not healthy for their child to listen to. It's almost like the saying “don't judge a book by it's cover”, but in this case it would be “don't judge a band by the words before the meaning”.
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