What has music come to these day?!!

It's not a new fact that I can't understand the words of music as I hear it on the radio.  Sometimes I can pick up phrases and I'll sing along to those... or I'll just make up what I think I'm hearing, even if it's all off the wall lyric singing.  :)

When I was 10 or 11, my grandma flew in from Florida, and the family took a trip to Walmart.  Yes, going to Walmart in those days was exciting!  TG&Y & KMart were no longer the exciting stores in town.. it was WALMART!  Well, my grandma worked at Walmart, and so she said she would buy something for my brother & I. 

At that time, Madonna was starting to come out on the radios in popularity.  I loved Madonna and her music.  I picked a cassette out (yes, we didn't have CD's yet), and it was Madonna's newest cassette titled "Like a Virgin."  My grandma said "WHAT?  You listen to THAT?!"  She wouldn't let me buy it.  I didn't understand what the big deal was.  She kept saying "do you even know what a virgin is?"  I said "no.."

Now that I think back on those days ... I wonder why my parents didn't make me turn the station when inappropriate songs came on.  Probably b/c they knew I was completely naive and would have NO clue what some of these words meant.  I was naive!  Just as clueless as I was about "Greased Lightning" on Grease ... it wasn't until I was in college that someone said "I can't believe my parents let me listen to that song!  It's SO inappropriate!"  I went 'huh?  what's so inappropriate about men fixing a car?' I finally, just a few weeks ago, watched a YouTube video showing the lyrics to the song.  Yeah... it's inappropriate.  Yeah.. my girls listen to it. 

Last week I read a Facebook status of a friend asking her friends if she should talk to her kids about the Whistle song.  I knew about the Whistle song... I heard it.  It's catchy.  I sing along.  Then I asked Katie about it.  She knew what it was about.  She told me.  My heart fell.  I went "WHAT?!  are you SERIOUS?"  So, I went to YouTube AGAIN to see what the lyrics were, and wow oh wow.  What has this world come to?  Why are our radio stations broadcasting these songs?  Why isn't there an XRated Radio station that people can listen to their expletive, racy songs?

Why do I have my 10 year old singing "Starships" and the singer is saying something like "effing mother" (or something like that ... it's 6 in the morning while I'm typing this).  Seriously?  I just want to tell the music industry to grow up .... that little kids love music, and really, we don't need them to grow up so fast at age 4, 8, or 10, or 14. 

My friend's friends were telling her that they let it slide... that their kids were just singing along to it, and most likely did not have a CLUE what it meant.  Just to let kids keep on being kids.  She finally admitted that when it comes on, she will change the station.

What has music come to these days??  What do you do in your family?  Let it slide... or change stations?