The Fletcher Memorial Home

You have it right regb. Roger is criticizing peace destroyers who then send people to die for their conflicts. The name Fletcher Memorial Home is a very sad origin indeed. The name Fletcher was part of Roger's father's name, full name being Eric Fletcher Waters. These are the kinds of people that sent Roger's father to die out there in the war, people who had nothing to do with the conflict, people who really wanted no part of fighting but were doing it out of duty or whatever else was implanted in their minds by the politicians. These are the people that treat life as something that can easily be tossed aside. Reagan and Haig represent our government, Mr. Begin and friends are Israel, Mrs. Thatcher and Paisley represent Britain, Mr. Brezhnev and party is the former U.S.S.R., McCarthy represents hatred, Nixon represents corruption, and the anonymous latin-american meat packing glitterati represent Venezuela.

I believe that it is about all the cruel rulers of the world. Minus Hitler. They are saying "take these people and put them in the Fletcher Memorial Home where they will be treated like they treated others." All these cruel leaders are referred to as "overgrown infants" because really they haven't mature much. They are "incurable tyrants and kings". They'd have a tv showing themselves and what they did repeated over and over and they'd not be able to know anything else. "Did they expect us to treat them with any respect?" says how these leaders treated people badly and wonders how they could expect any respect after that. It shows how saying "boom boom bang bang lie down you're dead" is just a game to them and killing people is nothing. Eventually at the end it says "now the final solution can be applied" which means that now that they're here and happy and what not, we can use the final solution (Hitler's idea) on them just like they did to others.

No one seems to have noticed that the lyrics are wrong.

"they can polish their medals and sharpen their smiles, and amuse themselves playing games for a while boom boom, bang bang, lie down you're dead"

Now read it this way: "they can polish their medals and sharpen their smiles, and ABUSE themselves playing games for a while boom boom, bang bang, lie down you're dead"

It makes the song so much more powerful. Just think about it. Roger Waters sure knows how to write lyrics. The best song on The Final Cut.

I too have been wondering about that final refrain: "Is everyone in?" And "Now the Final Solution [caps?] can be applied." I really don't imagine that Roger Waters would intentionally trivialise the Holocaust, no. But I do not know whether he is suggesting that the Nazis' Final Solution be carried out ironically within the Fletcher Memorial home on the likes of Hitler – advocating the extermination of these "incurable tyrants" and "colonial wasters", which would be an expression of support for the death penalty (albeit in what Waters sees as extreme circumstances, they being beyond redemption). Or whether he is instead appropriating the Nazi's phrase for something else (in the way the 'suffragettes' empowered themselves by taking on this label applied to them by a sneering right-wing press; or the way gay people have adopted words that once demeaned them) – specifically using the phrase to mean some great work to repair the world that can only be undertaken once we've rid ourselves of these hideous people by locking them all up. I assumed the latter originally, the home being (patronisingly) comfortable – I thought that Waters meant let's lock them all away and then we can get on with sorting out the mess. Now I'm older and more cynical, I wonder if he didn't actually mean the former – lure them into the home then, when we've got them all, do unto them what the worst of them intended for the innocents. Either way, it's a powerful song on a great album.

I have seen the Wall (my mother saw it when it came out and hates PF with a passion for it, I can't even listen to them in her presence). The Wall, however, points out the fallacies with this view as part of a lifestyle and belief.

This song suggests that normal, sane people should start employing nazi-esque techniques, which is mildly offensive.

However, as a general rule, I don't mind WW2 references. The one in Your Possible Pasts (cattle trucks, like those used to ship Jews and others to concentration camps) is brilliant. As a matter of fact, I use WW2 references on occasion in my poetry (a lot of which resembles the Final Cut).

My beef is not with referencing WW2 (more specifically, the Holocaust), but with suggesting that people ought to emulate portions of it.

Great song, anyway.

Offensive, oh well. it's about the prime ministers of england or what ever, and it's basiclly saying that they dont respect them like when he puts there name with the "latin american meat packing glitterarty". It's a sweet solo, i still got bumps on my neck....DAMN YOU AND YOUR AMAZING GUITARNESS THAT MAKES ME HAVE GOUSSE BUMPS, AAHHHHHHHHHH!!!

They were also all post-WWII leaders, linus, as if to say that even after the tragedy of WWII, we still have not learned anything, and our leaders are still corrupt, incompetent, immoral, and stupid.

Or something along those lines.

Hasn't anyone here seen the music video for this song? Its about pinks WWII veteran schoolteacher who is depressed. When he goes to the fletcher memorial home, Napoleon, Queen Elizabeth, Winston Churchill. some guy I think is Lord Trenchard (Founder of the RAF) and even Hitler are there. The Latin American meat-packing glitterati probably refers to the Falkland Wars, (Britains war with Argentina over the Falkand Islands) which Roger Waters was clearly against. Roger Waters does indeed imply that we could have these "tyrants" gassed to death to keep them from causing more chaos and death.

If you want to see the video go to:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5685703707454679160&q=the+fletcher+memorial

Even though this is basically a Water solo album with Gilmour singing a chorus in one song, and doing a guitar solo here and there, I still love the album.

The song itself is self explanatory. Roger Waters does not like politicians.

Roger Waters is a musical genius, but he is also a political dunce. Reagan is far from a tyrant and should be celebrated by anyone that appreciates freedom. Oh well. I still enjoy the song.