Music as a Weapon???

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I am all in favour of playing classical music in as many venues as possible, but I'm not sure how I feel about this one. Music, of all forms, should produce harmony, be a way of bringing people together, not run them off or create a further divide between the ages.

In the store in Northhampton they are using classical music to "attack" the youth (ok, in a non-violent way) - but the concept is, "The teenagers hate the music so much that whenever it plays they simply move away." And since the idea of playing it is to push away the teenagers, this tells the teenagers - We don't want you. We are doing something you "hate" intensionally - which only serves to create more anger an animosity amoung the youth (IMHO).

In England there is a device known as the Mosquito which emits a high pitched frequency that typically only the young can hear. This is done for the same reason, to drive off the youth and prevent mayhem. However, in France, where it is (IMHO unfortunately) called the Beethoven, there is a call to ban the device - for even though it is effective, it is seen as discriminatory towards the youth.

This is not a call to allow the youth (or anyone) to be allowed to be disruptive. This is rather a question of the method. If we, as a society, segregate into groups (and music is used to help force the segregation) then the music used will be seen in a negative light (more so than it already is). This is not good news for classical musicians. Eventually those youth will grow up and replace the "older" segment of society. If they have grown up hating classical music, where will we find our audience?

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