Moms on YouTube
It was somewhat difficult to find a lot of good clips on YouTUbe dealing with moms. There were many options under the heading Hot Moms, but that really wasn’t what I was looking for. At the same time, just the fact that this was its own category says something about moms today. Now, not only do we have to take care of house and home and kids and all - we have to be hot too...talk about pressure.
Anyhow, as I was looking at clips there were several I thought were quite stupid and others I found very touching and interesting. Through them all though there were some common themes. I looked at clips dealing with teen moms, soldier moms, comedians discussing moms, and even a clip by Barack Obama praising moms.
I will cover my favorite clips though - The Mom Song, Christopher Titus: Mom’s Thanksgiving, Soldier Moms and Truth about Teen moms These were my four favorite because they either struck a chord with me or made me laugh.
In the first clip, The Mom Song, a comedian takes everything a moms says in the course of a day and puts them into a 2 min 55 second song. The structure of this clip is commercial, as it shows a comedian on stage with their audience during a live show. This comedian’s song became quite popular and was on several news programs and received much attention. The lighting was high key as the center area around the comedian was brighter than the sides and audience. The only; editing is going back and forth between the comedian and the audience. There are some close shots and long shots of the comedian. They show the audience at the moments when the audience is laughing and engaged in a certain comment. The only sound present, other than the speaker’s song, is background music - band type music to support her lyrics, a sort of “Off to the races� number. The sound is upbeat, rushed, and comical to add to the comedic effect of her song. There are no special effects or directing as the setting is a live comedy show with one performer - the comedian.
This song shows all the roles and responsibilities placed on a mom in a single day. Moms are to organize, discipline, teach, caretake, and play with their children, all their children, every day. This pokes fun at the repetition of motherhood as well as some of the commonalities between all moms.
What appeals to me in this clip is the honesty in the words. Everyone who grew up with a mom could relate to the comments made by the comedian. Regardless of the type of mom you had, we all heard the phrases shared. You could be a great, patient, loving mom or a busy, impatient, hectic chaotic mom and the phrases with resonate. This seems to fit. I found this then to be honest and not really biased.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxT5NwQUtVM
Another clip depicting moms in a comedic fashion was Christopher Titus: Mom’s Thanksgiving. Again this clip shows a comedian on stage. There is not a great deal of editing here, it is mostly the camera following the comedian as he moves around on stage. The lighting is again high key lighting. The only sound is the laughter of the audience and the comedian’s voice. The stage is interesting as it has a large plain wooden chair that the comedian occasionally sits in, a big window behind and a beaten up wall all around him. There are no special effects and other then the detail of the stage there is not much to the video.
This clip shows the complexity of the comedian’s mother. He calls her brilliant and manipulative, beautiful and crazy, loves her kids, kills her husband. Each shows the complexities of his mother. He loves her mother but does not see her as perfect or flawless - in fact he sees her as quite the opposite. He brags up her high qualities which are traditionally feminine, wise, speaks several languages (romantic), amazing cook, creative woman. Although he points out how wise she is he also points out how terribly unwise she is when it comes to men.
This clip spoke to me because though it deals with the tough issue of domestic violence, it shows the many sides to moms and females in general. Many of the clips viewed or articles read about mothers seems to typecast women into being a certain type of mom - this clip, although it shared some commonalities with the others as far as the qualities of moms, also allowed the mom to be many types without limiting her to one role.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-P2kxPEQ11Q
The last clip I will discuss is the Soldiers’ Mother clip. This clip is a music video of sorts that a singer/songwriter put together for all moms who have soldiers overseas. In this clip the singers words are accompanied by still images of mothers and soldiers as well as mothers alone and soldiers alone. She sings of ho the moms are waiting for the call from their sons to say they are OK and that even if they do not receive the call they will hide their tears and be brave because that is what their role is. It attempts to unite soldiers’ moms and support them as well.
This clip is not an action video but has images blending together through various transitions. Words at the beginning and end are added as well.
What grabbed me about this clip is, well first of all - my husband was deployed three times to Iraq over a four year period. He spent a total of 2 years overseas and during that time I obviously struggled with his absence but his mom did as well in a different way and I felt badly for her. I don’t know what I would do if my son were overseas like that, because, as corny as this sounds, doesn’t matter if your little one is two days old or thirty years old - they are your little baby. The other reason this clip grabbed me for this assignment is that it shares some of the themes I saw about moms - like the other clips the moms are loving, supportive, proud, caretakers, and there for their children above all else. All these women are very different moms but the title mom unites them in so many ways so that a clip like this one, or a song like the first example, can easily unite them despite their otherwise extreme differences.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h9Zx8RcBguQ
All the clips mentioned, as well as others I viewed showed mothers as the following
strong but vulnerable
loving caretakers proud
supportive touching
creative inspiring
devoted to their children
children respected, appreciated, feared, and admired them whether 10 or 40.