In the present political climate of fear, uncertainty, and division, the most important form of resistance is continued defiance and unwavering hope that things can be made better. Throughout history, in unstable times, one method of control by governing bodies has been instilling hopelessness and creating division. The age-old trope of building walls, both physically and ideologically, to maintain control through spreading hatred and distrust of differences and diversity. During this increasingly unstable time, not falling victim to panic and suspicion is one of the most important requirements to solving the issues we are facing. One Ancient Greek myth which has been adapted to a modern flair, embodies this lesson. Singer/songwriter Anaïs
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Throughout the song, the mesmerizing call and response weave together positive words in relation to the world inside the wall which are juxtaposed to those outside and beyond the wall. Four key terms arise in the song: build, wall, free, enemy. These words set up a god/devil dichotomy. Often in rhetoric, ‘building’ is a positive action which involves building friendships, bridges, or knowledge. In building, things are created and distributed to make the world a better place. In this context of building a wall, the wall is what should be positive. In the mind of Hades, and by extension the mind of those who have no choice but to follow his beliefs, walls and division are good because they provide a line between order and chaos, freedom of thought and control, power and weakness. However, the message which the song, and by extension the whole show conveys, is that power corrupts and unchecked power corrupts absolutely to the detriment of those who do not directly benefit from that power. Additionally, ‘free’ is pitted against ‘enemy’ but this also has a caveat. Freedom, from Hades’ perspective is simply a buzz word which his followers want to hear. It is what he can promise them without having to deliver anything real. The ‘enemy’ in his mind are those without freedoms exhibited by control and order. ‘Poverty’ and ‘keep out’ appears adjacent to ‘enemy’ in the song while ‘us’ is stated strongly in relation to freedom, and the walls which keep the bad things out. Overall, the words and clusters which form around the rhetoric of this piece show the phenomena of ‘othering’ people who do not fit into the prescribed entity which is
Throughout the song, the mesmerizing call and response weave together positive words in relation to the world inside the wall which are juxtaposed to those outside and beyond the wall. Four key terms arise in the song: build, wall, free, enemy. These words set up a god/devil dichotomy. Often in rhetoric, ‘building’ is a positive action which involves building friendships, bridges, or knowledge. In building, things are created and distributed to make the world a better place. In this context of building a wall, the wall is what should be positive. In the mind of Hades, and by extension the mind of those who have no choice but to follow his beliefs, walls and division are good because they provide a line between order and chaos, freedom of thought and control, power and weakness. However, the message which the song, and by extension the whole show conveys, is that power corrupts and unchecked power corrupts absolutely to the detriment of those who do not directly benefit from that power. Additionally, ‘free’ is pitted against ‘enemy’ but this also has a caveat. Freedom, from Hades’ perspective is simply a buzz word which his followers want to hear. It is what he can promise them without having to deliver anything real. The ‘enemy’ in his mind are those without freedoms exhibited by control and order. ‘Poverty’ and ‘keep out’ appears adjacent to ‘enemy’ in the song while ‘us’ is stated strongly in relation to freedom, and the walls which keep the bad things out. Overall, the words and clusters which form around the rhetoric of this piece show the phenomena of ‘othering’ people who do not fit into the prescribed entity which is