AN EVIL MELODY

To the top of the American hit parade last week came an odd, awkard little song called "Judy's Turn to Cry."

Arranged for a pathetic teen-age girl's whining voice, the song that is now Number One in the land is all about a lovely young lady who is delighted over the severe depression being experienced by a girl named Judy who has only recently lost her boyfriend. Judy apparently had stolen the boyfriend, someone by the name of Johnny, from the girl singing the song.

Evidently after undergoing a long period of unpleasant self-appraisal, the singer stages an attempt to repossess Johnny from Judy. At some sort of high school social entertainment, she approaches a second, and totally innocent boy and kisses him on the check. She then steps back and waits for a reaction from Johnny who promptly smacks the unknowing dope in the nose, "because he loves me, that's why." And then, it seems, it's Judy's turn to cry.

It is, of course, an agonizing and inordinately embarrasing ballad, not only because it is stupid, but also for what it portends for the American people. The country's ever-burgeoning record-buying public consists largely of teen-age girls, people who sadly will soon be America's mothers. These are the people who determine what song shall be Number One. These are the people who are willing to buy a philosophy like "Judy's Turn to Cry."

Perhaps these girls do not support violence or even vengeance. Perhaps they themselves would not sing about the unhappiness of another girl. Maybe they only like the music played in the background of these ugly lyrics. But the fact remains that into their impressionably young bosoms a philosophy is seeping. Even if they do not listen to the words, they hear them subconsciously and are affected by them. The evil behavior of the characters in "Judy's Turn to Cry" adds to the degeneration of American society.

The writers of hit parade songs should return to the garbled lyrics of a few years ago when teen-agers were wailing "Oco-oo-oo-ah-ah; Tingtang, Walla-walla bingbang" and the like. Such a philosophy is surely easier for the adolescent mind to handle.