It's easy as a man to read a few texts (typically labeled as "feminist texts", I like to think of them as "keeping it real texts") and then profess your personal disgust for your own gender. Ironically enough, instead of professing this disgust to men (you know the people who should probably be educated about these topics), you immediately seek out a woman, typically so you can subconsciously fish for reassurance that men aren't that bad and even if they are, you are now enlightened and therefore exempt of all negative association. Well you aren't.
Male privilege is a thing and whenever men make statements like "I get it, but..." or "I don't think it's that bad", I know to just ignore them because typically something ignorant is about to be said. And that's not to absolve myself of this ignorance. I say stupid shit like this all the time and while I typically catch myself and backtrack, there are sometimes where I (and even some of my friends who are women) miss how my patriarchal framework blurs out my male privilege.
For example, let's take Lupe Fiasco's popular song "Bitch Bad", which received mix reception among people. Some people thought Lupe was simply telling it how it is and was actually doing a service for African American women by making necessary commentary on how African American women were negatively perceived and expected to act in the current culture. Many feminist disagreed vehemently (with good reason too), but were promptly ignored. This is because on it's face, "Bitch Bad" is a song that rails against the negative stereotypes typically ascribed to women and instead advocates for a positive outlook. However, if one were to listen to the song a few more times it's clear that the song was written by a man for women.
I won't give an in-depth analysis of why this particular song is problematic, but I'll leave this here http://www.policymic.com/articles/16236/lupe-fiasco-bitch-bad-sexist-single-makes-hip-hop-women-look-bad for anyone who's interested. Hopefully you've read the article and agreed (if you just took my word for it, then that's pretty foolish of you) and realize how problematic Bitch Bad really is. Now to be fair, Bitch Bad is more than just making commentary on women, but more specifically African American women. I think this key difference changes some of the rules of engagement rhetorically, but doesn't do much to blunt the clear misogyny or as one critic described it "mansplaining" that Lupe engaged in. And yet when I first heard this song I thought it was incredibly progressive. One might wonder how could I? Raymond clearly women are made powerless in this song, why couldn't you see that? That's because when oppression isn't overt, it's essentially invisible to those who aren't looking for it.
So I guess this a charge to the men who aren't being morons. We need to do better and be better about having a critical eye. A part of wrestling with our male privilege is taking an impact calculus on how it affects the world around us. Furthermore, we cannot look to women for explanation. An ally doesn't offer support, then immediately ask the person being assisted to do it for them (well sometimes this does happen, the mantra typically goes "help me help you", but that's besides the point). Still, even with all of this, I know that it will be a struggle. There will be slip ups and times where we let ourselves down. To say that's ok and we could try again next time is unacceptable. We need to be better. Plain and simple.
A note on the title: The title of this post can be read in various ways. First I could be saying it in a literal sense, insofar that the individual in question isn't bad. Or I could be siding with women who aim to reclaim the word bitch. The final explanation is a simple repudiation of Lupe's song title. I won't admit to which one I intended as I think that all three of those interpretations can provide for good discussion alone.
A simple break down of the misogyny of the song:
I realize that many of you won't read the article so to explain misogynistic nature of the I'll just give two key examples.
First, the chorus blunders through feminist issues in order of magnitude from slight ignorance to complete disregard for agency. The first line, "Bitch Bad", again comes into conflict with any attempts to reclaim the term. Women good being spoken by Lupe reaffirms the patriarchal tendency to ascribe value to women as if they were an object. Continuing with this trend of objectification, Lupe imbues the normative lady, by stating "lady better", but what constitutes a lady is never explored, leaving only the prototypical explanation for lady as the only possible interpretation. Finally, he says "they misunderstood, primarily talking about the women in the song. Why can't men be included in this. Why isn't it we misunderstood, signifying society's disillusioned state? Then he completely butchers it with "I'm killing these bitches", continuing the unfortunate tradition of violence being directed at women who have been determined to be sub-par.
Second, the premise of the song is a young girl and young boy meeting later as young adults. Both go through this disillusionment process as children. But for some reason the girl is the one that is "caught in an illusion", but the boy miraculously was able to pick up what a positive woman is supposed to be. This is an unaware microcosm for the ignorance of this song. Just as Lupe thinks he knows what a woman should be like, this young man also thinks he knows what a woman should be like, with any input being given my woman either being completely discounted or ignored.
Male privilege is a thing and whenever men make statements like "I get it, but..." or "I don't think it's that bad", I know to just ignore them because typically something ignorant is about to be said. And that's not to absolve myself of this ignorance. I say stupid shit like this all the time and while I typically catch myself and backtrack, there are sometimes where I (and even some of my friends who are women) miss how my patriarchal framework blurs out my male privilege.
For example, let's take Lupe Fiasco's popular song "Bitch Bad", which received mix reception among people. Some people thought Lupe was simply telling it how it is and was actually doing a service for African American women by making necessary commentary on how African American women were negatively perceived and expected to act in the current culture. Many feminist disagreed vehemently (with good reason too), but were promptly ignored. This is because on it's face, "Bitch Bad" is a song that rails against the negative stereotypes typically ascribed to women and instead advocates for a positive outlook. However, if one were to listen to the song a few more times it's clear that the song was written by a man for women.
I won't give an in-depth analysis of why this particular song is problematic, but I'll leave this here http://www.policymic.com/articles/16236/lupe-fiasco-bitch-bad-sexist-single-makes-hip-hop-women-look-bad for anyone who's interested. Hopefully you've read the article and agreed (if you just took my word for it, then that's pretty foolish of you) and realize how problematic Bitch Bad really is. Now to be fair, Bitch Bad is more than just making commentary on women, but more specifically African American women. I think this key difference changes some of the rules of engagement rhetorically, but doesn't do much to blunt the clear misogyny or as one critic described it "mansplaining" that Lupe engaged in. And yet when I first heard this song I thought it was incredibly progressive. One might wonder how could I? Raymond clearly women are made powerless in this song, why couldn't you see that? That's because when oppression isn't overt, it's essentially invisible to those who aren't looking for it.
So I guess this a charge to the men who aren't being morons. We need to do better and be better about having a critical eye. A part of wrestling with our male privilege is taking an impact calculus on how it affects the world around us. Furthermore, we cannot look to women for explanation. An ally doesn't offer support, then immediately ask the person being assisted to do it for them (well sometimes this does happen, the mantra typically goes "help me help you", but that's besides the point). Still, even with all of this, I know that it will be a struggle. There will be slip ups and times where we let ourselves down. To say that's ok and we could try again next time is unacceptable. We need to be better. Plain and simple.
A note on the title: The title of this post can be read in various ways. First I could be saying it in a literal sense, insofar that the individual in question isn't bad. Or I could be siding with women who aim to reclaim the word bitch. The final explanation is a simple repudiation of Lupe's song title. I won't admit to which one I intended as I think that all three of those interpretations can provide for good discussion alone.
A simple break down of the misogyny of the song:
I realize that many of you won't read the article so to explain misogynistic nature of the I'll just give two key examples.
First, the chorus blunders through feminist issues in order of magnitude from slight ignorance to complete disregard for agency. The first line, "Bitch Bad", again comes into conflict with any attempts to reclaim the term. Women good being spoken by Lupe reaffirms the patriarchal tendency to ascribe value to women as if they were an object. Continuing with this trend of objectification, Lupe imbues the normative lady, by stating "lady better", but what constitutes a lady is never explored, leaving only the prototypical explanation for lady as the only possible interpretation. Finally, he says "they misunderstood, primarily talking about the women in the song. Why can't men be included in this. Why isn't it we misunderstood, signifying society's disillusioned state? Then he completely butchers it with "I'm killing these bitches", continuing the unfortunate tradition of violence being directed at women who have been determined to be sub-par.
Second, the premise of the song is a young girl and young boy meeting later as young adults. Both go through this disillusionment process as children. But for some reason the girl is the one that is "caught in an illusion", but the boy miraculously was able to pick up what a positive woman is supposed to be. This is an unaware microcosm for the ignorance of this song. Just as Lupe thinks he knows what a woman should be like, this young man also thinks he knows what a woman should be like, with any input being given my woman either being completely discounted or ignored.
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