Cardi B - WAP

submitted by dadahorse from self.GenderCritical

I have isolated myself from much of modern pop culture, so I am used to being clueless over it. I only recently bothered to watch the YouTube video of this song. Sexed up music videos weren't anything new when I was a kid.

But back then nobody advertised this shit as "empowering."

No wonder girls are opting out of womanhood, I'd want the same if I was their age. When listening to "Barbie Girl" back in the day, most of the lyrics were at least innuendo. And that's a low fucking bar that modern pop stars fail to clear.

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[–]MarkTwainiac 13 insightful - 1 fun13 insightful - 0 fun14 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

In 1980, WAP stood for the feminist organization Women Against Pornography. Now it stands for Wet Ass Pussy, a song and video in which female pop stars pander to dick, the male gaze and the basest male impulses by embracing and seemingly reveling in their own sexual objectification and degradation - and the whole thing is touted as "empowering." This is not progress.

[–]MezozoicGay 9 insightful - 2 fun9 insightful - 1 fun10 insightful - 2 fun -  (2 children)

Music videos and texts are so sexualized nowadays, especially in rap. There always one or few man and a ton of half-naked oversexualized women around trying to please those men. If it is song of a woman singer, then she herself is half-naked and performing sexualized dances. Most popular stars on Twitter and most watched female singers on Youtube are Cardi B and Ariana Grande - and their clips are just sexualization created for male gaze. Previously there were similar clips and sexualized productions too, but they weren't the majority and they were less openly sexualized, and women had more cloths.

Each new Ariana Grande clip is making records in "most viewed video in first 24 hours", and most of them are just pornography: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QYh6mYIJG2Y

I can imagine girls, especially tomboys or gender non-conforming, are feeling very uncomfortable growing up, when surrounded by this everywhere.

[–]MarkTwainiac 8 insightful - 2 fun8 insightful - 1 fun9 insightful - 2 fun -  (1 child)

Yes, MezosoicGay you're right on the money.

It's so different from when I was growing up in the 1960s and 70s. There was tons of sexism and sex discrimination against girls and women then, but at the same time radio and TV were filled with boys and men singing popular songs about how much they were head over heels in love with girls and women.

[–]forwardback 4 insightful - 2 fun4 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

Agreed. 1981, MTV started. Conceptual videos, story-telling, or featured the band. (Admittedly, sexism frequent). Early '90s, the slide down the slope (rap influence) gained speed. I remember Sir Mix-a-lot's "Baby Got Back" - catchy tune that broke out of rap, into the general, section of MTV, for example, and the "dam was broke."

Edit. US society. https://www.theodysseyonline.com/medias-effects-sexual-identity