its amazing how far music can come.. 24 years after it released and its one of the most heartfelt songs ive heard
If you could see the women and children,
the people we've all laid to rest.
If you could bomb a city the size of Chicago here,
tell me where is your conscience now?
Destroy and rebuild; a campaign of contracts,
the shifting of power, deciet and lies.
You call it the idea of promoting democracy.
I call it a franchise.
Are you the person they sent to save me?
Cause I don't want to be saved.
Killing is easy when you don't see faces,
and you don't have to dig graves.
Culture as given, the American ideal
that there's only one way to live your lives.
There's no one there to help you when they start the bidding.
You're packaged and sold to the allies.
You broke down when you believed a single word
that self-motivated politician said.
You broke down, and when it's all over
we're left with the mess.
Are you the person they sent to save me?
Cause I don't want to be saved.
Killing is easy when you don't see faces,
and you don't have to dig graves.
You broke down and believed in this war.
the people we've all laid to rest.
If you could bomb a city the size of Chicago here,
tell me where is your conscience now?
Destroy and rebuild; a campaign of contracts,
the shifting of power, deciet and lies.
You call it the idea of promoting democracy.
I call it a franchise.
Are you the person they sent to save me?
Cause I don't want to be saved.
Killing is easy when you don't see faces,
and you don't have to dig graves.
Culture as given, the American ideal
that there's only one way to live your lives.
There's no one there to help you when they start the bidding.
You're packaged and sold to the allies.
You broke down when you believed a single word
that self-motivated politician said.
You broke down, and when it's all over
we're left with the mess.
Are you the person they sent to save me?
Cause I don't want to be saved.
Killing is easy when you don't see faces,
and you don't have to dig graves.
You broke down and believed in this war.
Lyrics submitted by SeanBrownBike
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I will take the honors and pop Smoke or Fire's comment virginity. What a beautiful piece of work here. I believe it's a warning against what is packaged to the public as to what to put your faith in. It's a warning against being seduced by the culture that surrounds us; the siren song that lures us into believing a war's alright or that certain agreements are justified.
"Killing is easy when you don't see faces, and you don't have to dig graves."
mmm....delicious.
'and when it's all over we're left with the mess'
I see this as sung by a growing up child who has figured out what has been happening to his world for the past few generations. "This war" being the struggle to survive as an individual under the constant sensory and mental bombardment our societies present. Each one of us makes choices throughout our lives that will in some way or another leave an effect that our children will experience. The lyrics seem to be more specifically about 'a' war but the organization or machine that is 'doing' the war is the same one that is 'doing' the corporate development of our society. I see the same destructive forces from the same sources of motivation acting within our own land and affecting us. If we consider 'us' as the people, from the land, one with our future generations, timeless, then the only thing that is truly important is the place for us to be. It is unfortunate that we have been so led astray from this basic principle of life that we, all of us, unwittingly damage our 'place to be' with our most basic of daily routine habits. At this point, 'killing' is a true aspect of the accumulation of our actions on our place, spurred on by the machine.
And the faces that will receive the land will never see ours to know just how duped we were.
"You broke down when you believed a single word."
I'm pretty sure "This war" actually refers to the war on terror and how people call it "the idea of promoting democracy" but it's more like america trying to boost it's income and police the world.
"Are you the person they sent to save me? Cause I don't want to be saved."
This song is definitely about the war on terror, and going into other cultures and telling them how they should live their life. Smoke or fire is not an emo band using half-ass allegories involving landscape-ish vocabulary to convey how their sad about their girlfriends. This is punk fuckin rock, taking a stance on a contemporary issue: the war on terror. I don't mean to be a dick but it's quite embarassing to see someone try to say otherwise.
'you can bomb a city the size of chigaco here, tell me where is your concience now?'
brilliant.