Your Country Music Is No Saint
Before anyone decides to rip my head off — if they are a country fan — I will say that I myself am a fan of country. However, that doesn’t mean I can’t look at country (or any genre of music for that matter) through a critical lens.
I’ve heard time and time again that hip-hop and rap is so misogynistic and violent or that they glorify drugs and abuse. Honestly, when we live in a sexist and patriarchal world, that is going to be seen everywhere and is not mutually exclusive to Hip-hop.
Yes that means that your country music is misogynistic, as is Indie, Rock and Alternative, Metal, Pop-Punk, K-Pop etc. The music industry in general is a bundle of problematic.
Sorry while I break a couple of hearts here
But lets take a look at Luke Bryan’s video for That’s My Kind Of Night. The chorus starts off with, “All them other boys wanna wind you up and take you downtown,” basically implying that all these guys want to get with this girl. His next line is “But you look like the kind that likes to take it way out,” and I take that as Bryan implying that she “looks” like the type of girl to give it up to whoever. Way to slut-shame women country music. And this isn’t even talking about the objectification of women in the video itself.
Dexter Thomas says in his article Why is #MasculinitySoFragile , “The fear of emasculation is so ingrained in our society that it can make men violent.” This violence isn’t only seen in Hip-hop and rap.
One of the first songs I thought of when thinking about masculinity and violence in music was Immaculate Misconception by Motionless in white. Just to quote some of the song lyrics
“ Put your teeth to the curb, cuz right now I’m gonna stomp your fucking face in
I hope you drown in all the cum you fucking swallow”
And we talk about rap being violent? This song is rooted in violent imagery simply by the lyrics, not to mention what the actual music video is like. While I can appreciate the sentiment and calling out some righteous religious folks on their bigotry, the violence in the song does show a sense of hyper-masculinity in itself.
This sense of hegemonic masculinity ( as Described by R.W. Connell, “ Hegemonic masculinity was understood as the pattern of practice that allowed men’s dominance over women to continue.”) isn’t just seen with male artist, but is also transcribed with female artist as well. Take for example Before He Cheats by Carrie Underwood. Talk about falling into the crazy ex-girlfriend narrative. Not only that, but multiple times in the song she is addressing the other women as a tramp, white-trash, chastising her for getting fruity drinks (I mean who doesn’t like bit of sugar in their alcohol). All of these being forms of slut shaming, which is a result of hegemonic masculinity, and playing into the “I’m not like other girls” trope. Hegemonic masculinity is normalizing the dominant male and submissive virtuous women. By not performing this trope, women are then labeled as the crazy ex-girlfriend, sluts, whores, tramps etc.
Just to name a few songs not within the hip-hop realm that are violent/misogynistic:
All Time Low-the irony of choking on a lifesaver
Avenged Sevenfold- A Little Piece Of Heaven (which is basically about necrophilia)
Buckcherry- Crazy Bitch
Robin Thicke- Blurred Lines (as if we aren’t surprised)
Katelyn Esmonde states, “…it must be acknowledged that in a deeply racist and classist society, many black men are disenfranchised due to the oppressions which are inherent in the structure of society, making it considerably more difficult for them to attain the hegemonic ideal.”
It comes at no surprise to me that black men and black artists have to jump through so many loops to be recognized for their masculinity, that when they are on the brink of getting that, society jumps down their throats for being violent, abusive and sexist when that same hegemony is seen everywhere.
When you associate rap and hip-hop as black music, it erases the fact that black people are in every musical genre and you are actively participating in anti-black sentiment (which is an entirely different conversation, but intersectionality is a thing) . I mean Jada Pinkett-Smith was in a metal band, the former lead singer of Killswitch Engage was black. Jimi Hendrix? Prince?? And I can bet not many people even know of Sister Rosetta Tharpe.
None of this is to say not to criticize hip-hop or rap, but to criticize all music because sexism and violence isn’t exclusive.
And next time your listening to Lil’ Wayne and decide he is problematic ask yourself,
- Am I only criticizing hip-hop
- Why am I criticizing this and not others
I can guarantee that people being disillusioned by rap and hip-hop are not taking into consideration the many things that intersect with music and the industry.
