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Do What You Want Lyrics
Hey do what you want, but don't do it around me.
Idleness and dissipation breed apathy.
I sit on my ass all goddamn day,
A misanthropic anthropoid with nothing to
Say what you must, do all you can,
Break all the fucking rules and
Go to Hell with Superman and
Die like a champion, yeah hey!
Hey I don't know if the billions will survive,
But I'll believe in God when 1 and 1 are 5.
My moniker is man and I'm rotten to the core.
I'll tear down the building just to pass through the door.
So do what you must, do all you can,
Break all the fucking rules and
Go to Hell with Superman and
Die like a champion, yeah hey!
This song can be misenterpreted and difficult to understand because it is more satirical and sarcastic than literal.
To explain it in English, Its directed to the kids of their and even our generation who are reveling in thier "I dont give a fuck" stage. And its hard to see but its condemning them.
Its like.... you know what.. fuck it... I give a fuck..
But you obviously dont give a fuck... so go ahead..
break all the rules... live with no fucking morals...
fuck everything over..
be the discracefull piece of shit your gonna be..
Who am I to condemn you Im rotten to the core as well..
do the stupid pointless shit your gonna do to ruin us all..cuz theirs nothing I can do to stop you...
But stay the fuck away from me..
Pinkfade does it again!!! Once knew a "kid" (ten years or + younger). Met him when I was a baker. Clearly didn't like me. Later, saw him one day and decided to sell him some pot. We started hanging out. Listened to Bad Religion together. Said he loved the song "Do What You Want." Next thing I know, someone (probably him) steals $1,200 worth of weed from me and my wife.
Pinkfade does it again!!! Once knew a "kid" (ten years or + younger). Met him when I was a baker. Clearly didn't like me. Later, saw him one day and decided to sell him some pot. We started hanging out. Listened to Bad Religion together. Said he loved the song "Do What You Want." Next thing I know, someone (probably him) steals $1,200 worth of weed from me and my wife.
To be fair, it was him or our roommate. (50/50).
To be fair, it was him or our roommate. (50/50).
@pinkfade I think that is one possible interpretation.
@pinkfade I think that is one possible interpretation.
I think the underlying message of this song is that someone can be well educated or at least generally on the level and still not contribute or not care to contribute anything to society. This is easy to see because the person they're describing is a generally uncaring yet somewhat socially aware individual as we can see in lines like.
"Idleness and dissipation breed apathy."
"Hey I don't know if the billions will survive, But I'll believe in God when 1 and 1 are 5."
The thing most people seem to miss with Bad Religion songs is that most of them are actually satirical, in that they actual think they opposite of what the song is trying to say. Especially their more anthemic songs like this and "A Walk."
They use large words in their songs probably because they know their meaning and when you have a large vocabulary, it's difficult to think and communicate your ideas in sentences when there are perfectly good words already invented and at your disposal that do the same thing.
But from a meaningful point of view, maybe the use of "misanthropic anthropoid" for example conveys a sense of detatchment from other people. Rather than describing himself as a misanthropic person, or a person who hates people (which would be rather ironic) he describes himself as an anthropoid which is someone resembling a person, or classified as a person, instead of actually being a part of humanity.
Just a thought.
Damn this song is great. Bad Religion is nice as hell! Good lyrics i might add.
Hey I don't know if the billions will survive, But I'll believe in God when 1 and 1 are 5.
from Arm: "I know what they are talking about but just using a bunch of big words makes you look like a pseudo-intellectual rather then smart."
very true, but do you think maybe that line in this song was a stab at the pseudo-intellectuals? that's what comes to mind for me.
I didn't think so. I just thought of it as a punk telling everyone to do what they want and use big words so they dont sound like morons. But it could be a stab at the pseudo-intelluctals.
I just figured it out... This song from the perspective of someone who hates what Bad Religion stands for and is creating a cariture of what they represent.
I actually wrote a paper about this song, comparing it to "Thus Spoke Zarathustra" by Friedrich Nietzsche. There is the whole idea of the superman and surpassing human existence.
It's kind of hard to be a pseudo-intellectual when in fact you're a full blown intellectual. Greg Graffin just published his doctoral thesis, you can buy it on badreligion.com...so I guess he has a reason to know big words after all, eh?