Apparently today was the 35th anniversary of John Lennon's death. That means that I heard the same song over and over today - "Imagine". I heard a snippet of "Imagine" on the news, it seemed to be on all the pop channels on the radio, and I heard an orchestral version on the classical station. Even the all-Christmas-music-since-mid-November station decided that playing "Imagine" was the thing to do. The problem? I'm not a fan of Lennon's "Imagine".

Now, I don't mean any disrespect to Mr. Lennon. He was a brilliant songwriter by any account, and I like a lot of his work. But I don't like "Imagine", because it presents a dark, dystopic future as if it were  . . . fun. Or something. I know, I know, you think I'm crazy - but have you ever really listened to the words? And thought through some of the implications? It's actually pretty scary stuff. Here, let's go through the lyrics, and I'll show you what I mean . . .

Imagine there's no heaven
It's easy if you try

Things start off pretty innocuously. I mean, I think heaven is a pretty good idea, but each to their own, right? The true dystopic horror doesn't start until the next couple of lines.

No hell below us
Above us only sky

Okay, read that second part again. "Above us only sky". That means we're limited to earth's atmosphere. Everything outside of that can go take a hike. We're left with no moon, no sun, no other planets, no asteroids . . . in a fell swoop you've wiped out tide pools (won't somebody think of the sea urchins?!), shooting stars, space opera, and, well, with the sun thing, all life on earth. Nice job, Mr. Lennon. But let's pretend there's still a sun, because if everyone's dead the rest of the song makes no sense at all.

Imagine all the people
Living for today...

In what way is this a good idea? Life becomes super-awkward if you ban planning ahead. Want to invite some friends to go to the movies on the weekend? Mr. Lennon thinks that you are what's wrong with the world.

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do

And . . . now I'm imagining a world where nobody has any political representation and there is no rule of law. Isn't that, like, one of the definitions of dystopia?

Nothing to kill or die for

While I'm in favour of nothing to kill for, I can't say I feel the same about things to die for.  There are a lot of things worth dying for. Family. Friends. Truth. Justice. . . . apparently Mr. Lennon doesn't think a parent should try to save their child from a burning building, because there's nothing worth dying for. Not a world I think anyone would want to live in.

And no religion too

A world with no religions would suck, big time. Besides the well-known health and social benefits of religion, and all that, you know, charitable stuff, religion has made a huge contribution to the arts. This is the part where, if this weren't Wattpad, I'd flood the page with pictures. Instead, you'll have to Google everything yourself. Just know that Mr. Lennon apparently does not think that the world should have any ziggurats or Greek temples or cathedrals. He also thinks we'd be better off without the Nike of Samothrace, the Pieta, and pretty much anything ever painted by Hieronymous Bosch. If that weren't enough, he's also proposing a world with way less Bach and Mozart, and no Gregorian chant. Think about that for a moment - no Gregorian chant. That would leave anime directors with no go-to music for the part of the show where the giant robots come to life due to some weird combination of magic and science. Terrible.

Imagine all the people
Living life in peace...

This would be good if it were a plausible result of the above, but without countries, the dispute about anime soundtracks will soon spread to encompass the whole world in eternal warfare. Seriously.

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one

If the song were not sufficiently dark already, Mr. Lennon feels he must threaten the listener, by implying they will join him . . .

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can

As a person who gets emotionally attached to physical objects, this is like lining all my friends up against a wall and shooting them.

No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man

Um, Mr. Lennon? You didn't say 'shared possessions'. You said 'no possessions'. So everyone's going to be very hungry, and, until they starve to death, greedy for a warm coat to wear in the snow. Wait, maybe they'll freeze before they starve.

Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world...

Sharing all the world with whom? I, for one, do not welcome our alien overlords, thank you very much!

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one

And, to close things off, another threat. Not that we'd care, by this point. We'd be the hungry, cold slaves of alien overlords who have taken over our planet when we were beaten down by our soundtrack wars. Or we'd just never have existed at all, because of that no sun thing. Real cheery song. Real cheery.