Cleveland radio station drops “Baby It’s Cold Outside” from Christmas playlist for being problematic

When the week began, I did not foresee “woke backlash to innocuous decades-old Christmas fare” becoming a recurring topic on the ol’ blog homestead. Yet here we are.

We used to play the song “Baby It’s Cold Outside”, but you’re the Christmas Executive Officer at Star 102 and you told us it’s no longer appropriate. I gotta be honest, I didn’t understand why the lyrics were so bad…Until I read them…

Now, I do realize that when the song was written in 1944, it was a different time, but now while reading it, it seems very manipulative and wrong. The world we live in is extra sensitive now, and people get easily offended, but in a world where #MeToo has finally given women the voice they deserve, the song has no place.

I feel like the real news here is that the station was still playing it until today. People have been after this tune for years. This isn’t even our first post on the site about it. Larry O’Connor wrote about the seasonal BICO irritation for us in 2016 and noted that grumbling about the tune was stale even then. How have the woke brigades not already succeeded in wishing this song into the cultural cornfield?

I for one immensely enjoy a Christmas duet sung by two lovebirds that playfully raises the prospect of [checks notes] roofying:

The neighbors might think – Baby, it’s bad out there
Say, what’s in this drink? – No cabs to be had out there

That’s the line that raises the most feminist hackles. But don’t forget the old-school slut-shaming too:

There’s bound to be talk tomorrow – Think of my life long sorrow
At least there will be plenty implied – If you caught pneumonia and died

When I was young I found the song odd simply because it blended yuletide cheer with heavy-handed sexual seduction, not normally a pairing that go together. They might as well have called it “Christmas Boink.” But as I aged I came to realize that things were different in the olden days, that maybe it wasn’t unusual at the time for a man to invite a young lady over on a cold winter’s night, drug her, refuse to let her leave, and then drag her off to his rape dungeon. Gotta remember that every era is different.

Exit question: Would you rather see the song informally banned or replaced by a “woke” version? Because those are your only two choices, you know.