Robin Thicke's Allusion In Crossing The Line

According to Mary Eberstadt, "contemporary adolescent popular music, especially the subgenres of heavy metal and hip-hop/rap, is uniquely degraded – and degrading – by the standards of previous generations." When compering music in the past and today, it is important to compere musical lyric too. Modern music is more aggressive and coarser than old music. Contemporary lyrics describe misogyny, violence, suicide, sexual exploitation, children abuse and other bad things. Mary Eberstadt explains the changes in musical lyric as a result of changes in society. Nowadays, music is not censored. In her essay "Eminem is Right," Eberstadt wrote about how Eminem is right in his songs because he understands the current family crisis that millions children

In the essay, “Hip-Hop’s Betrayal Of Black Women”(221), by Jennifer McLune, she vents her feelings regarding hip-hop songs that are rhythmically diminishing the value of black women. She provides example on how the lyrics are being voiced and how hip-hop artists do not seem to care. Kevin Powell in “Notes of a Hip Hop Head” writes, “Indeed, like rock and roll, hip-hop sometimes makes you think we men don’t like women much at all, except to objectify them as trophy pieces or, as contemporary vernacular mandates, as baby mommas, chicken heads, or bitches” (221). There have been apologizes for what the rappers have said but nothing to resolve the dehumanization of black women. McLune informs the readers that hip-hop singers belittle black women and make them invisible. Jay-Z, a popular hip-hop artist is brought to center stage by McLune. The essay shows the example of a part of Jay-Z song that says, “I pimp hard on a trick, look Fuck if your leg broke bitch hop on your good foot” (222). This lyric is a perfect example of how hip-hop artist have no remorse in the words they sing. The hurt feelings and loss of self-esteem black women suffer, is of no concern to the rappers. McLune expresses that those who are underground hip-hop artist follow the footsteps on being sexist and using crude words in their lyrics just because they yearn and dream of being in the spotlight. Upcoming rappers want to be loved like Jay-Z and other famous notorious rappers.

In Joan Morgan’s “From Fly-Girls to Bitches and Hos,” her feminist point of view addresses the problem of degradation and sexism in rap and hip-hop music. Through this passage, Morgan looks at the deeper meaning and connects rap and hip-hop music with the African American community. Between the beats, the lyrics of this specific genre of music show listeners various situations the African American community deals with, like crime, drugs, alcohol, relationships, and their day-to-day life in America. With Morgan’s feminist criticism, she states that the blame is not only on rap and hip-hop artists, but also other women because they should be speaking out against being called “bitches” and “hos”. Through the rhetorical strategies of description,

Millions of people in the world listen to music for all different reasons. Most people all over the world listen to different genres of music in order to relax, but not too many people pay attention to the actual lyrics of a song. If you listen to the lyrics of a song you will realize that many songs have important messages or themes to them. An example of this is the lyrics of the song “Changes” by Tupac Shakur. If you listen to this song, you will realize that Tupac raps about not only the problems that African Americans face from society, but also the struggles that poor people in society have to endure and overcome. Many

Goats, half-naked ladies, and hashtags; yet the most memorable thing about Robin Thicke’s song, “Blurred Lines”, is the lawsuit that surrounds it. Most fans of Marvin Gaye will be able to recognize his song “Got to give it up” and the way it was ripped off by Robin Thicke. But the issue goes deeper than just plagiarism; there is also the issue of cultural appropriation. A song originally done by a Black man was stolen, had the lyrics changed, and put back out with someone else claiming credit for the work. This is not new for Black artists. The genre of rock came from Rhythm and Blues, or R&B, which came from jazz, and so on through Black tradition. Yet as time has shown, there has always been a dominant White force that comes in and adopts,

Music is a magnifying glass on society. Listeners get a glimpse of race, gender roles, wealth, love, and more from a specific time period. Take current rap songs streaming on the radio today. Behind the curse words and what seems like gibberish is actually insight on the current world and what issues the artist is going through. For example, Kendrick Lamar’s hit “DNA” may seem to many like a explicit waste of words, but when studying the lyrics, one sees that Lamar is actually reflecting on his black heritage and on the ecomonic and racial struggles he has had growing up in Compton.

It is suggested that one of the reasons why artists use misogynistic lyrics in their music is that they have internalized the negative stereotypes about women that are prevalent in American society. African women were historically portrayed as animalistic sexual beasts and African males in a submissive role, giving in to wild instinct or bodily impulses. The internalization of such stereotypes may be a possible explanation of the hyper sexuality within certain hip hop music. Various authors have argued that misogyny is merely an outgrowth of the cultural acceptance of misogyny at large.

An issue many have with Hip Hop music is it over-sexualisation of black women. Within hip hop music videos and the lyrics used to define women, are often portrayed in ways that calls for them to sexually satisfy men. Hunter and Soto (2009), highlighted that women in hip hop music are often characterised as sex workers. Their study coincides with Miller-young (2008), who argued Hip-Hop music has an obsession with portraying women as strippers in their song. She pointed out that Hip-Hop music is extremely misogynistic with males being shown as pimps whilst females are shown involved in sexual acts. This shows that within Hip-Hop music males are shown to be the dominating sex. This can impact on women negatively due to the fact hip-hop has become

For example, a man who sleeps with numerous women is praised for his actions by other fellow men, labelling him as a player. Meanwhile, being a virgin as a guy is ridiculed and one is encouraged to have sex with a woman to become a “real” man. Although, it is the complete opposite scenario for females, as Lisa Jervis states in her article, “An Old Enemy in a New Outfit: How Date Rape Became Gray Rape and Why It Matters”, “...females can either suppress their sexual desires or be a slut and get what they deserve” (Jervis, 168). Women who seek to have sex with more men are immediately labelled a slut or a whore, especially if they exceed a certain number of sexual partners seen as unacceptable to society’s standards. Therefore, they are not pitied when they are raped because sexually open and non passive females cause society to assume that they were simply looking and asking to be raped.

When she screams rape, the author’s response is that she was right that she was being raped. Then he portrays her as being a willing participant, even lifting her legs to help “Chinaski” in the sexual act. When the sex is over, “Chinaski” nonchalantly leaves showing that, unless she is sexually servicing him” she has no value and is not even worth his time. Her lack of value beyond sex is accented by the fact that the rapist doesn’t even acknowledge her claim of rape. Her ignorance is highlighted when, even after she becomes a willing participant, she still screams rape, as if she doesn’t even know what that

Blurred Lines is a popular summer song that is constantly played on the radio. A song like “Blurred Lines” should not be played on public radio. A big problem with “Blurred Lines” is that it attempts to normalize disrespectful behavior towards women. Robin Thicke teamed up with rapper T.I. and singer-producer Pharrell to deliver arguably this summer’s most popular song. The song “Blurred Lines” has placed number one on the billboard hot 100 and has sold over one million copies. Critical reception of the track is mostly positive. Yet with the success comes a not so positive response. When first listening to the song a person might find themselves nodding your head to a catchy tune, but perhaps once a person listens closely to the lyrics some people may not want this song on their iPods.

The researchers conducted their study by taking samples of songs released from 2000-2010. These songs selected for this sample were based off a three base-line criteria. “First the song needed at least one rapper lyric, then there needed to be a narrative to or about a woman with no relation to that rapper, and finally it needed to contained terms and emotions associated with philogyny such as love, like, adoration, fondness, and admiration” (Tyree & Jones, 2015, pp. 63). Thirty-eight songs ended up being chosen for this study and the artists who rapped in them fit in these “classic rap categories” which include gangsta, materialistic, positive, and pop. Once these songs were chosen, a textual analysis was conducted to analyze these rap lyrics.

The first reason lyrics of popular music is considered harmful to teens and children because it have contains inappropriate content in the song . According Varda Epstein lyrics written by men an artist by color where most likely too include sex references . This shows that men and younger boys have an effect on how to

Lyrics in the music business have always been a popular ‘trend’ since music was first created. Music was generally discovered by a male, which could be a shock to many but today, it’s more common for females to write songs. From a simple tune to paragraphs about a topic, song lyrics have come a long way. Song lyrics started with very few genre types and now there’s multiple! “ Though music evolved continually, the researchers identified three stylistic “revolutions” during which the change from one year to the next was unusually large: Around 1964 (the era of British bands), 1983 (the rock era) and 1991 (the era of mainstream hip hop).” (Huffington Post). Now, it seems as though lyrics have evolved from something small and rarely heard of to one of the most popular things in the

The attempts to diminish the seriousness of rape while hiding the true meaning of consent can be seen through the recent use of “nonconsensual sex” as a replacement for the word “rape.” Essentially, “nonconsensual sex” is euphemism for rape. It is seemed as less serious while simultaneously supporting rape myths like placing part of the blame on the victim. Oliver strategically builds upon this point by providing statistics and specific examples that reflect cultural infatuation with sexual assaults, especially by young college students. As people start diminishing the seriousness and malice of rape, it allows room for justification and uncertainty. Thus, Oliver rightfully suggests that not only does this uncertainty nurture a rape culture, it also serves as immunization to those who commit such heinous acts.