The Depressing Thought Of Being An Adult

 

 

I spent the holidays listening to endless playlists that contain nursery rhymes of every kind, more accurately they’re more or less the same nursery rhymes in different voices as you learn after buying them all. Anyway, after a while I couldn’t help but actually listen to some of them and to my surprise most of them seem to be written to induce depression in babies about growing up. I wish it was funny, but unfortunately it is true. Before we proceed here are some of them:

 

London Bridge is falling down,
Falling down, falling down,
London Bridge is falling down,
My fair Lady.

Build it up with wood and clay,
Wood and clay, wood and clay,
Build it up with wood and clay,
My fair Lady.

Wood and clay will wash away,
Wash away, wash away,
Wood and clay will wash away,
My fair Lady.

Build it up with bricks and mortar,
Bricks and mortar, bricks and mortar,
Build it up with bricks and mortar,
My fair Lady.

Bricks and mortar will not stay,
Will not stay, will not stay,
Bricks and mortar will not stay,
My fair Lady.

Build it up with iron and steel,
Iron and steel, iron and steel,
Build it up with iron and steel,
My fair Lady.

Iron and steel will bend and bow,
Bend and bow, bend and bow,
Iron and steel will bend and bow,
My fair Lady.

Build it up with silver and gold,
Silver and gold, silver and gold,
Build it up with silver and gold,
My fair Lady.

Silver and gold will be stolen away,
Stolen away, stolen away,
Silver and gold will be stolen away,
My fair Lady.

Set a man to watch all nigh,
Watch all night, watch all night,
Set a man to watch all night,
My fair Lady.

Suppose the man should fall asleep, 
Fall asleep, fall asleep,
Suppose the man should fall asleep? 
My fair Lady.

Give him a pipe to smoke all night,
Smoke all night, smoke all night,
Give him a pipe to smoke all night,
My fair Lady.

 

AND

 

Rock a bye baby on the tree top,
When the wind blows the cradle will rock,
When the bough breaks the cradle will fall,
And down will come baby, cradle and all.

 

Then there’s Humpty Dumpty who nobody can put together or the Ring-a-Ring ‘o Rosies in which all fall down, the latter is about everyone dying in the bubonic plague from the symptoms of Red Rashes that appear in rings!!!!

 

While one has always been aware of songs being a reflection of the times when they were written and hence not always optimistic, I (probably I am really ignorant) had no idea that nursery rhymes were nothing but laments of the time. I am not sure if any child psychologist has measured what effect this subliminal negativity has on the children, but it seems to me that there is a need for some new nursery rhymes that allow kids to see that the world is not a place of gloom and doom where everything will go wrong and they’ll get jacked.

 

A bunch of you probably think I am overreacting to the whole thing (ok I concede there’s a bit of truth to that), but I still figure a move towards more positive rhymes can’t really do more damage.

P.S.: The reason for the picture is to say there are anyway other reasons for a kid to be depressed about growing up, why add another one.