CROCODILE TEARS OR POST-MODERN MANIFESTO?
— A Deconstruction of Bindi Irwin's "Save Me"
From a thematic perspective, Bindi Irwin's environmentalist critique of modern capitalist society, 'Save Me' deals with issues of violence, death, cruelty and freedom. The narrative is penned by the oppressed flipper of what we as the audience guess to be a humpback, southern right, or other 'baleen' whale. Thus, Irwin uses the technique of personalisation in order to to give the 'whale song', pun intended, its resonating and chilling tone. From the outset, the role reversal of Irwin's sonata places the greed and cruelty of humanity at the fore, prompting the audience to contemplate and reflect on their place and responsibilities as custodians of the seas. Themes of death are interwoven amongst the narrative, as our 'friend', the 'giant of the sea' calls upon the collective conscience of society to protect the freedoms that we as humans take for granted and apply them to our 'warm blooded and skin covered' relatives. A self-conscious awareness, an ability to contemplate mortality and to contextualise identity is inherent to the text. Subsequently, Irwin brings our protagonist to recall times before the reign of man - to times of a 'wonderful blue planet...before humans overran it'. This blatant environmentalist agenda seeks to undermine man's hegemony on the ecological stage and subvert the traditional notions of state actors as justified in their exploitation of wildlife. Thus, Irwin's 'Save Me' is a timely and reflective narrative that deals with pressing and contemporary issues in a style that engages the reader on a spiritual and social level. A piece that epitomises the self-reflective and post-modern nature of the youth of today, both brilliantly constructed and immaculately executed.
On a more personal level, the devastating psychological conflict of the tweenage poet resonates throughout her lyrics. When listening to the track, it becomes immediately clear that Irwin's "whale" persona is an anthropomorphic projection of her inner existential turmoil. This is a sharp allusion to a long line of animal allegories which Irwin would have no doubt encountered, such as "The Rainbow Fish" (a striking, if hamfisted plea for the immediate introduction of a global socialist state) or "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" (a stark reimagining of Buddha's Fire Sermon and the emancipation from material desire in a consumerist world gone wrong). The overt phallic imagery of the opening line; "Save me, from the man with the harpoon gun"; is a desperate plea for girlish innocence in a world of patriarchal lust. The lyricist, on the cusp of puberty, desperately clasps to the pristine blemishlessness of childhood, where she and her cohort remain "winged angels playing games in the ocean blue". Irwin feels the palpable loss of this Edenesque state, and cries to be saved as the waters of the abyss surge above her impractically large Khaki collar. Man, the hunter, the bringer of death, takes on an a predatory, even Nabakovian character as he and his "boats that catch and slaughter" ruthlessly engage in the corruption and destruction of this crumbling child. However, "Save me" is more than a futile plea for the preservation of sexual innocence; entwined through the work is a curious dialecticism that jostles with the primary message for prominence. The major turning point in Irwin's artistic life is undoubtedly the premature demise of her father. Steve served his daughter as the loving protector of "Eden" – her innocence, and more superficially, the environment – against the ghastly machinations of perverse, self-serving hunters. Yet Irwin the Elder was felled not by an agent of man and his all-tainting industrial empire but one of the very creatures he devoted his life to protecting. The object lesson of this bloody cataclysm is that nature – Gaia if you will – is an amoral force and a fickle mistress that is at once majestic and terrible, she slays her allies as unflinchingly as her foes. The bitter paradox at the heart of Irwin's spiritual narrative is that the erosion of nature and innocence was initiated by nature and innocence itself. Sexual maturation, the eradication of our orcine brethren through natural selection and parental death ala stingray are all inherent aspects of the thing we call life, a phenomenon that despite it's "freedom in the water" is perpetually self-eroding and ultimately self-destroying. This is a profound microcosm of the 21st century predicament: that with the rise of anthropogenic global warming, nuclear arsenals and relentless overconsumption, life itself has become it's own greatest threat. The true tragedy of "Save me" is Irwin's gradual realisation that to fight against such inevitably is folly; and like a pigtailed Kierkegaard or a wallaby loving Plath, she finally sees that her only choice is to join her beloved father in the "deepest ocean". Indeed Bindi, the deepest ocean of all.
