How Cardi B & Meghan Thee Stallion’s ‘WAP’ Exposed a Deeply Rooted Cultural Problem
Women get sexually objectified everyday. What’s the problem?
As a society, we live with some really twisted cultural convictions in our moral compass that seem to pass as a form of justice in the eyes of the beholder. You might know these as ‘slut-shaming or ’‘rape culture’ or ‘honour culture’.
Slut-shaming
A quick look at the Wikipedia page and here’s your perfect intro:
Slut-shaming is the practice of criticizing people, especially women and girls, who are perceived to violate expectations of behavior and appearance regarding issues related to sexuality.
This doesn’t end with women. At the other end of the spectrum, men face their own battle with ‘toxic masculinity’. But note that nowhere in the definition for slut-shaming there is an implication of its toxicity.
Rape culture
In most countries, rape culture still blames the victim as the provocateur, even if our understanding of the word consensus hasn’t changed. Yet context somehow has the power to change its meaning.
Once the provocateur becomes the prey, the predator has no choice. It’s his nature. Despite our evolution, we’re nothing more than animals. Or at least we’re getting degraded to the level of animals in the context of rape.
While we’re here, let’s take a peek at Wikipedia:
Rape culture is a sociological concept for a setting in which rape is pervasive and normalized due to societal attitudes about gender and sexuality.
That’s right, rape culture is (getting) normalised.
Honour culture
In classic psychology, there’s the concept of negative reinforcement. When you don’t conform to the expectations of the creator’s rules, you’re punished.
Honour culture kind of serves the same function. Only when you mess up, you’re out for good. The creator of the rules in this context follows the guidance of a higher Creator, justifying the murder of a family member with religious beliefs.
Honour killing, according to Wikipedia, is a type of domestic abuse. If you read the reasoning behind it, you might get a glimpse into the extreme misogynistic mind that still exists today:
Women are viewed as property and not as individuals with their own agency. As such, they must submit to male authority figures in the family — failure to do so can result in extreme violence as punishment. Violence is seen as a way of ensuring compliance and preventing rebellion.
It is disturbing what some cultures would do to extend their power over one’s freedom of choice, speech or movement. Even more disturbingly, we are all part of it, since all things in life are connected.
How is Cardi B & Meghan Thee Stallion’s song ‘WAP’ connected?
A single song can’t start a revolution, yet it did. I’m not talking about a twerking revolution. But then again, even the act of twerking could be perceived as a form of rebellion.
To twerk in public in some societies means to break free from the norms created by those who only want to see this kind of promiscuous behaviour in a controlled environment. The strip club. The brothel. The massage parlour. The private places where men can do as they please without any limitations, consequences or moral impediments. Where men can explore their predator side while women act as the alluring prey.
In other words, men don’t want to stop women from expressing their sexuality, as long as they are setting the rules of when and how.
The problem about women singing about their WAP and expressing their sexuality publicly means that men are no longer in control of the narrative, that women are not one-dimensional.
While a single song can’t start a revolution, it started the conversation.
Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion successfully stole the narrative even if for a brief status quo alteration. Well, not so brief actually.
4 weeks after the release of ‘WAP’, both men and women are still talking about its significance.
What Cardi B and Meghan Thee Stallion did was, in fact, to reverse the male gaze. They became the provocateurs who got your attention not by being exposed but by being empowered.
We saw and heard from women who were equal to men in the context of freedom of choice, speech and movement.
Since the female gaze was the one directing the plot, men got a taste of their own medicine. It felt uncomfortable but necessary. It felt revolutionary.
It’s going to take a lot more than an explicit song, of course, to bring about a permanent cultural shift, but it’s clear that peaceful talking won’t make the much needed difference either.
We are still warning women to be cautious as they might get raped, instead of teaching men to control their impulses and that they can’t do as they please with women.
This deeply rooted cultural problem won’t go away just because we’ve slightly shifted our attitude towards it.
If by talking about eradicating racism, changes happened automatically, we wouldn’t have so many protesters out on the streets of every major city right now in the middle of a pandemic. Because racism is killing more lives than COVID-19 ever could.
If by talking about female empowerment and leadership, men listened, perceived and treated women as equal, then we wouldn’t need to have songs like ‘WAP’. Because slut-shaming, rape culture and honour culture are destroying us: our mothers, daughters, sisters, cousins, aunties, friends.
We need to work for the revolution. It’s time to take back the narrative.
The #WomenTalking Takeaway
Education starts at home. What children see and hear, they repeat. When boys see that men are disrespectful to women, that’s what they absorb as the norm. When boys acknowledge that ‘real’ men are predators, that’s what they aspire to become.
While ‘WAP’ might not be an appropriate educational song, it offers another point of view. Women are not silent. Women have a mind of their own, full of fears, hopes and desires. Women are powerful.
Cardi B and Meghan Thee Stallion might not be your average role models, but neither should be men who preach ‘grab them by the pussy’.
Our moral compass as a society needs re-evaluation ASAP.
If you enjoyed this article, keep an eye on my column Women Talking for more stories on how women are changing the world. 💃
