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Daily Lyric: MISGUIDED RIGHTEOUSNESS

Updated: Oct 9, 2023

You came here

To sing protest songs

Your voice raised

With the liberal ways you hold true

But we’ll follow

The way of this land

No universalist is going to tell us what to do


So get out!

We don’t need you here

Not you, and none of your misguided righteousness!


If your western eyes

Don’t see fairness here

That’s just tough luck

Very little in the world is fair

If your mind

Can’t accept that

It’s your problem not ours

For your morality we don’t care


So get out!

We don’t need you here

Not you, and none of your misguided righteousness!

Your concepts

Just won’t work here

You’re destroying us with your misguided righteousness.


America

Such a wonderful land

Dedicated to truth

Justice and equality

American values

Work all right there

But over here

There’s an ever so different mentality

Your “oppressed” ones

See our land as theirs

And they mean to kill us

For your information

‘Cause America

Is big enough for everyone

But there’s no room here

For two separate nations


Your concepts

Just won’t work here

So don’t even try to apply your misguided righteousness

Well get out!

We don’t need you here

Not you, and none of your misguided righteousness!


©2023 The Hesh Inc.

Joan Baez, Wombofied - original AI art by The Hesh Inc.
So get out. We don’t need you here. Not you, and none of your misguided righteousness.

This was written in 1988, after Joan Baez performed in Israel. Naturally, the press oohed and aahed over her appearance there, and gushed over her political statements as well as her choice of songs. But there was a small group of protesters at her Jerusalem appearance, telling her in no uncertain terms that her activism and sentiments were not welcome; among these protesters were people who had once been fans of her and her music in the 1960s, but since moved to Israel and adopted national-religious political beliefs. I was serving in the army at the time and could not get off my base for any of this, but had I been able to, I would have joined these protesters.


Musically, I based the lyrics on the music for Little Steven Van Zandt's "Trail of Broken Treaties." I was worried at the time, given Steve's left-leaning activism throughout the world, that he would join the anti-Israel chorus, and the song was partially fueled by this feeling. However, Steve is an astute observer of the world and is more than capable of filtering the truth from the flood of lies presented by that ilk, and has pushed back against calls for him to apply the false 'apartheid' label to Israel, to his immense credit. In any event, I never recorded or performed this song, beyond banging it out on my piano.

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