Reader’s Choice/Tom’s Top Tunes…Song #48/250: Games Without Frontiers by Peter Gabriel

I have often maintained that we, as a society, do ourselves an injustice by allowing our cultural upbringing to colour our worldview. A simple non-musical example of this pertains to Christmas and, in particular, to Santa Claus. In North America, I grew up with the story of the birth of the Baby Jesus intertwined with the story of the North Pole and elves and reindeer that could fly. It was just the way it was. Evidently, many people in my part of the world still maintain those traditional beliefs, because in recent times we have had the whole “War on Christmas” debate come up that would seem silly if it wasn’t so divisive and mean-spirited and dangerous. There is an us-versus-them, right-vs-wrong element to this debate that is predicated on the assumption that the story of Christmas that I grew up believing is the only version that matters and that anything different is a threat to that point of view. Sigh! The thing that always bothers me about debates such as this is that they are tainted by self-imposed restrictions caused by our cultural worldviews. If people stretched their thinking even a little, they would find that even in those countries where Santa-like figures are acknowledged, not everyone even calls that person Santa Claus. In some countries he is Father Christmas or Kris Kringle or Sinterklaas or Père Noël. Are the citizens of those countries wrong because they call the deliverer of gifts by a slightly different name than we do? Then, of course, we have those parts of the world in which Santa Claus and the story of a Jewish babe hold no water at all. In none of those countries is Christmas hated or scorned. It simply doesn’t matter because people around the world sometimes have different beliefs that form the foundations of their societies and that is OK, too. They are allowed to follow their own path. The problem comes, whether it is concerning Christmas or anything else, when we attempt to force this limited, restricted, ours-is-the-only-way-that-matters mindset on others. Acknowledging that other cultural viewpoints exist is not the threat that it is made out to be by those who seek division and discord. Learning about other beliefs actually helps to expand our minds and it can also expand our hearts if we are open to it. So, what does this have to do with Peter Gabriel and his hit song “Games Without Frontiers”? As it turns out, it has everything to do with it. Let’s take a look at how a song about war and politics helped to reveal the cultural blinders that I have worn my whole life, as it turns out. Happy 74th birthday, Mr. Gabriel! Here is the story of “Games Without Frontiers”.

As many of you may know, Peter Gabriel first came to prominence as the lead singer of the prog. rock band called Genesis. That early incarnation of Genesis was every bit the equal to bands such as Pink Floyd, Rush, Yes and so on. Gabriel left the band in 1975 and began a solo career that included songs like “Solsbury Hill”, “Sledgehammer”, “Big Time”, “Don’t Give Up” (with Kate Bush), “Shock the Monkey”, “Games Without Frontiers” and “Biko”, making him one of the most well known and successful singers in the world over the course of that next decade or so. In addition to his musical prowess, what Peter Gabriel most became known for was his politics. The highest profile instance of this was his role as one of the faces of Amnesty International, which is an organization that highlights the plight of political prisoners and others who have suffered human rights abuses in countries around the world. Of those whose causes Gabriel championed, none was more famous than that of a South African man named Steven Biko. While Gabriel’s stirring rendition of his song “Biko” *(which you can read more about in a previous post here) was one of his most overtly straightforward political offerings, his song “Games Without Frontiers” ranks right up there, too, in terms of the political message contained within the lyrics of the song. However, I have to admit that my own cultural background limited my understanding of this song until just recently. For most of my life, especially my pre-Internet life, I did not even fully understand what the lyrics were saying, let alone their full meaning. But I had always liked the tune, so I kept this song in my library of favourite hits. But now that I know the broader story behind these lyrics, it makes me question what other songs and stories I have completely missed the mark on because of my restricted cultural worldview? So, without further delay, here is the real story behind one of Peter Gabriel’s most well known and popular songs, “Games Without Frontiers”.

I started this post off by discussing Santa Claus because he is a cultural symbol that is fairly well known throughout our society. You don’t need a university PhD to understand who Santa Claus is. However, as I pointed out, there are entire societies around the world who have no idea at all about Santa because of their own geographic location in the world, their political and religious belief systems and so on. Those people who don’t know about Santa Claus or, at the very least, know of him but don’t think about him because he plays no role in their world, are not stupid people. They are merely people whose worldview precludes the knowledge of the jolly man in red from their lives. When it comes to “Games Without Frontiers” the same logic applies to me in reverse. I grew up in an age where watching television as a family was a thing. We subscribed to TV Guide magazine, faithfully poring over the weekly programming outlines, circling our must-watch shows and planning our week accordingly. The shows that I grew up watching were ones that I assumed everyone watched because the episodes and the characters on the shows were all that anyone seemed to talk about. If we were watching M.A.S.H. or All in the Family or Friends, then everyone was. What wasn’t on TV wasn’t questioned. What was on TV was all that there was, wasn’t it? Well, as it turned out, not everyone in the world grew up watching the same TV shows that my family and I did. In fact, in many parts of the world, there were entirely different television programmes that starred actors who were famous celebrities in Europe or Asia but who were completely unknown to me over here in North America. Obviously, North American celebrities were the celebrities who really mattered though, right? Well, just as with Santa Claus being the only gift giver who matters, it seems as though my celebrity star system only really mattered over here, too. All across Europe and Asia and Australia and Africa, there were people growing up who had their own cultural worldviews shaped by watching TV shows that were unique to their corners of the world. One such example of this became the inspiration for “Games Without Frontiers” by Peter Gabriel.   

From 1965 all the way until 1999, a time period that encompasses the first two thirds of my life on this planet, there was a French game show that was broadcast across Europe called Jeux sans Frontières or Games without Borders. The idea for this game show apparently originated with French President Charles de Gaulle. He thought that a show which featured a series of athletic and intellectual contests between the citizens of French and German towns would go a long way toward helping to rebuild relationships between the two countries that remained strained in the fallout from WWII. Over time, other countries became involved and the audience for Jeux sans Frontières spread across Europe. As the show went on and the ranks of participating countries swelled, the types of contests became more elaborate, as well as being more farcical in a Monty Python sense. The show was a hit in England, too. However, over there they changed the name for English audiences to It’s a Knockout! Jeux sans Frontières/It’s a Knockout! was broadcast across Europe the entire time that I was home watching The Price is Right with Bob Barker and American Bandstand with Dick Clark, and yet I never knew it existed at all. One person who did know it existed was Peter Gabriel.

Even though the show was meant as good-natured fun, there was a certain sense of civic pride that came with winning the competition for your town and, by extension, your country. It was this competitive nationalism that struck Gabriel as being what is wrong with our world at its core. Why wasn’t the show designed upon the notion of international cooperation to achieve certain goals? That format could still be funny and played for laughs but that was not what was considered to be good for ratings. Competition brought out the audience numbers. And so, Jeux sans Frontières/It’s a Knockout continued on and on throughout the 1970s and 80s and into the 1990s. Peter Gabriel viewed the show as being a microcosm of the world’s ills. He viewed most national leaders as being motivated by small-minded self-interest. He also viewed many as not necessarily being the sharpest minds available. Furthermore, Gabriel viewed the entire idea of small national groups, clinging to pieces of the planet defined by arbitrarily drawn borders as being one of the biggest threats to the survival of humans as a species. If only world leaders would act in concert with each other for the benefit of their peoples and for the environment, then maybe, just maybe, we stood a chance of not only surviving but thriving as a planet. So Peter Gabriel wrote about his feelings in the form of a song that he titled “Games Without Frontiers”. In the lyrics to this song, Gabriel references the UK show with the line that says its full title, “It’s a Knockout!”  But what was really a revelation for me was that Kate Bush also sings on this song and that she sings in French!!! I had listened to “Games Without Frontiers” dozens of times over the years and never knew that Kate Bush was even on the song, let alone that she is heard whispering “Jeux sans Frontières” all through the verses underneath Gabriel’s own voice. This song makes so much more sense now that I understand the cultural underpinnings of the lyrics. Needless to say, when Peter Gabriel sings about the various names of the contestants, he is using names that draw associations with various countries or ethnicities. The imagery behind those contestants all holding flags of various colours is obvious now, too. That a song like “Games Without Frontiers”, which was a hit in my part of the world, was entirely based upon a popular television show that I had never even heard of, let alone watched, is as good an example of a cultural worldview limiting one’s understanding as I can imagine. 

Now that I have opened my mind to something new, I feel that my worldview has grown a smidge or two as a result. I have written this post as a tribute to Mr. Gabriel at or near the time of his birthday. I do so not to simply praise him or a song of his that I happen to like. I do so because it reminds me once again to open my mind as widely as possible. It is so easy to get stuck in a mindset that states that what we know is all there is to know and that all we know is all that actually matters in the world. We all are better off when we work together and share and  care about the wellbeing of others and our planet as we do about ourselves. “Games Without Frontiers” by Peter Gabriel brings home the valuable reminder that nationalism is not the path to everlasting prosperity and safety, as some chattering minds would have you believe. Something or someone who is different is not automatically a threat to be opposed. Accept the information being presented and then discard it and return to your life, or accept it and grow as a human being as a result. That is all. That is the message. Open your heart and your mind. It will be OK. 

Happy 74th birthday to you, Peter Gabriel. Thanks for a lifetime of great music.

The link to the official website for Peter Gabriel can be found here.

The link to the video for the song “Games Without Frontiers” by Peter Gabriel can be found here. ***The lyrics version can be found here.

The link to the official website for Amnesty International can be found here.

The link to an official website database for Jeux sans Frontières/It’s a Knockout! can be found here.

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