The year of 2013 recently came to a close and with that comes an overview of the most popular songs of the year. Any of you reading know most, if not all the lyrics to songs like “Fine China” by Chris brown and “Cruise” by Florida Georgia Line, but do you really know what’s being said?
As women, it’s our responsibility to recognize when we’re being discriminated against. Society views us as sexual beings, solely for male pleasure, and when we sing lyrics like “all she eat is d***/ she’s on a strict diet/ that’s my baby,” we’re giving consent to continue the injustice. Not to pick on Lil Wayne; he’s only one of the few artists that managed to coat misogyny with catchy lyrics and music.
“Fine China” by Chris Brown was an attempt to be soft and show a genuine side to him. When he sings out lines like “It’s alright/ I’m not dangerous,” it makes me beg to differ. He then follows up with, “We can take it slow or act like you’re my girl/ Let’s skip the basics,” which is worse. The song aims for Brown’s softer side but ends up failing miserably, heading right back into misogyny. The premise of the song itself, referring to women as “fine china”, is removing any sort of human qualities they hold, equating women to an object like a china plate: a breakable, irreplaceable object.
Everyone’s favorite country song, “Cruise“, also falls victim to possessing misogynistic qualities. “Yeah, when I first saw that bikini top on her/She’s poppin’ right out of the South Georgia water/Thought, ‘Oh, good lord, she had them long tanned legs!’/ Couldn’t help myself so I walked up and said…” and then the “baby you a song” lyrics that follow. Okay, country dudes. Way to do an awesome job of reminding women that the only thing that you value about them is how good they look in a bikini top and some short-shorts because all they’re good for is sex. I suppose they’re just supposed to take those tan legs and hop into the back of your truck without as much as an introduction to go cruisin’ all night, because you’re that irresistible. Things like this are totally awesome and definitely not sexist at all.
This song gets stuck in your head without you meaning it to be there, and that’s the worst evil of all. “Blurred Lines,” by Robin Thicke is highly misogynistic and we all know why. We don’t even need to explain. And now we have “I know you want it” stuck in our heads. Great.
Finally, in my eyes, the most appalling of 2013 is Rick Ross’s verse on “u.n.e.n.o“. “Put Molly all in her champagne, she ain’t even know it/ I took her home and I enjoyed that, she ain’t even know it.” Rick Ross takes home the rape-lyric cake. I completely hate his verses’ entire premise. Writing lyrics about drugging a chick and raping her will make your song the most misogynistic of the year even if artists like Weezy are using the word for a female dog like there’s no tomorrow. Rick Ross clearly lacks respect for the severity of date rape.
Though most of the songs listed are from the rap/hip hop genre, misogyny isn’t limited to these types of music. The only reason this type of music sells is because it’s been adopted on our culture to refer to women as derogatory terms just as long as it’s to music. Ladies, know your worth and realize that behavior like this shouldn’t be acceptable.