Another Brick in the Wall

I was listening to “Another Brick in the Wall”. A lot of memories came flooding by deluging my present.

We all know that Pink Floyd, the British Band’s number “Another Brick in the Wall” was banned in South Africa, was disregarded by Radio station in US and the song was literally assaulted by school teachers all over the world.

Nevertheless, the most admired record of the 80s was this song. It had a creepy tune in the background and Roger Waters showed us how schools and public establishments erected a wall so thick that one could not penetrate through them creating a vicious social condition around the individual. It is not new for students to question the value of their education and thus the song was received quite passionately.

In South Africa it was prohibited to play this song on the radio, stores could not stock or sell it and individuals could not own it. Freedom and liberty went up in thin air. In the land of Liberty (USA_) the tyrannical educationist tried to remove the songs from radio stations and teachers and principals raised their voices against the radio stations. All the protest and cries did not help and the record was in the number one slot for many months. Somehow the thoughts are always there on how children are meticulously tormented, agonized and disgraced by teachers.


Teachers and principals found this song quite offensive as this was a direct attack on their profession. And for some funny reason teachers have always thought that their profession was quite dignified and reverential. It reminds me of George Bernard Shaw’s statement, “those who can’t, teaches”. There should not have been any kind of anxiety amongst the teaching faculties as history has never seen students demanding reforms. They just choose to drop out when they feel that they have been wronged, or continue to get humiliated by the teachers.

Most students and during my time as a student I had always associated this song with a sense of frustration, disappointment and anger. The Song had 3 parts and the last part felt like Roger Waters was talking to me directly when he concludes that he no longer needs anything and dismissed all the people in his life as just “Brick in the wall” But what could I do? I was just “Another prick in the world”


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