Taylor Swift vs Nicki Minaj

[MyChildDoesntNeedSleep]

Apologies if already discussed. I couldn't see a thread.

What are your thoughts on this debacle? I have always been a Taylor fan, but since reading limited newspaper articles went over to Minaj's side. But then I watched the bloody Anaconda video and I just thought ffs, wtaf?!

Fauch it's interesting the interpretation you have of the song and the lyrics. It's a shame they come in such a shallow packaging, making NM so easy to write off (as indeed MTV have done).

I note that Rihanna won best video in 2012. I'm finding it hard to believe that Nicki was snubbed because she was black, it's so much easier to believe it was because the video is terrible.

@noble I sort of agree with the shallow packaging but it's pop culture and media isn't it? It's not very often a "They Don't Really Care About Us" comes along where a successful pop song by a huuuge pop singer is unmistakably political in ways that very much against the status quo (so i don't mean like campaigns for africa and what not) - most come watered down in some ways and that's sad :(
And yeah it's not that black people don't ever win, it's just there is a double standard and in the same way Obama, Oprah, etc have been able to succeed - one success doesn't negate the inherent racism of the music industry.

side note - I've just watched the Rihanna video that won the award.

Awful. I love that song but the voiceover at the start....I honestly wonder sometimes if we have so many people in horrible relationships because our culture tells us all consuming love is actually important.

Bad Blood is looking better and better! But yes, Rihanna won that award so....still not sure NM has a point. Also, re history of twerking, if NM's video had paid tribute to that, maybe, but there was a bloke there just eyeing up a woman's arse. Eugh.

Here's a short critique of the Anaconda video by some Washington Post journalists. (The Washington Post along with the New York Times are two highly respected US broadsheets.)

I think it is a fair representation of how educated people in the US would view the video. So, an intelligent view from inside the culture.

Forgot the link!

www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2014/08/20/nicki_minaj_anaconda_video_watch_her_celebrate_her_assets_in_the_visuals.html

That guy was Drake, friend of Nicki and fellow rapper and it's an in-joke because he's known for being the dorky lovesick puppy of rap (personally i find his voice weird and nasal and i don't find him attractive) - not at all the brute misogynists that most (black) rappers are portrayed as. Anyway his well-known crush on Nicki is oft joked about and she has no interest in him... the end of Anaconda is a reference and in joke regarding that because he never actually gets to touch her. Make of it what you will.

I don't know how I know so much about this, 95% of what I listen to are musical theatre cast recordings but I feel like I'm in with the cool kids now. ruins the illusion

I don't see what difference that makes. It is still a video of someone lap dancing. Is lap dancing cool?

Other than the heels and spandex, I don't see much difference between Swift's video and a My Chemical Romance one. I don't think I've seen a video of a guy lap dancing on a woman to show his lack of interest in her.

I think that NM has cleverly turned her "slim girls" tweet into a comment about racism in the music industry, when originally it was clearly a dig at TS, the only other woman (apart from Beyoncé) nominated in the category from which NM was omitted.

From a personal perspective, watching the anaconda video made me feel extremely uncomfortable, in the same way pornography does.

Wait what does MCR have to do with this, sorry? As in to prove how feminist she is because there's no difference between what she does and what men do?

Anyway Taylor Swift is a family fave but she's far from perfect. Did she not pit women against each other in "you belong with me"? Did she not pose with a boy in a swastika? I'm sure she's sweet and lovely but let's not pretend she's the pinnacle of feminist glory because in the same way you can't relate to what NM does, I don't relate to Taylor Swift, she doesn't speak for women like me and I find her neither here nor there, a bit non-descript. Granted though she is lovely to her fans.

Firstly, the whole video is not a lap dance and the bit with drake is as I explained it. I just don't think it's as black and white (ha) as "my feminism says doing X is bad so NM doing X is bad" because NM's feminism, and the feminism of many BW is very different to mainstream feminism (sorry I don't want to presume you're white?) but effectively from a white feminist gaze this is a woman titilating men for the pleasure of men and that - across all feminisms I'd say - is patriarchal.

But many black feminists view it entirely differently and considering white feminism has historically erased black women, black feminism does not owe white women a liberation that they accept, like or can understand. Black feminism is about black women, and although that sounds selfish we have a different set of struggles that we deal with in ways that are rooted in our own histories and contexts. The ways we deal with things might not make sense to white feminists but you have to remember the histories of our womanhood is so different. I'm not against fighting together, and it might seem divisive, but on our shared struggles we should fight together - but where our struggles diverge, a feminism that is rooted in black women's history better understands the needs and struggles of black women.

Wouldn't it be nice if there was some way for a women to show her "power" other than in making a man want to wank off?

And so what if she bats his hand away? It's still only "power" because she's playing into a male sexual fantasy, which is no kind of power at all.

I don't think Swift's video is either feminist or objectifying of women.

The Minaj video is pretty extreme objectification.

Almond - which MCR video please?

The bit with Drake is still "give the man a treat" even if he doesn't get an actual shag. I don't know the in-joke but the way it's explained isn't any different.

Achieve, I think there was a couple where they were dressed up in some kind of futuristic way and each had a 'character' and were travelling around fighting people.

Fauchelevent
I went back over NM Twitter feed just to confirm my understanding, her first tweet was ref 'women with very slim bodies', like I said, many black women are very slim too. You cannot interpret that as a comment about race.

TS then calls her on it re pitting women against each other and then NM changes tack and it apparently does become a race issue.
TS is PR savvy, not in a million years was she going to continue an argument once it became about race so she apologised, of course. Not all publicity is good publicity.

None of that changes the fact the NM video is utter shit and I would not want any young girl to emulate her or for that matter TS, who also comes across as fairly vacuous.

There is a debate to have around sexism and racism in the music industry but Minaj has shown no credentials to validate her involvement in a discussion on either count. Quite the opposite IMO.

She missed out on a nomination, toys went out of pram, that is as deep and wide as it goes.

Whichever way you look at it, the massive obsession with sex and body image is depressing.

Whichever way you look at it, the massive obsession with sex and body image is depressing.

The point is that black women in America have been demeaned for the last 400 years. Their bodies are seen as not pretty; they aren't desirable; they are not properly femine. In the worst of all possible worlds, where women's only asset/power is their looks/erotic capital, black women were denied even this..

So while I appreciate feminists wanting to move on from women just being seen as desirable, I can totally understand why NM would want to make the point that black women are highly desirable and capable of bringing a man to his knees through their sex appeal. Something that was always theirs, but was somehow denied through the sheer force of a hateful culture.

I can see that, Grey

Good point. But oh, what a world we live in!

Controversial long essay inbound (dons steel hat)

The point is that black women in America have been demeaned for the last 400 years. Their bodies are seen as not pretty; they aren't desirable; they are not properly femine. In the worst of all possible worlds, where women's only asset/power is their looks/erotic capital, black women were deniedeven this..

What can I say grey, yes, scientific study and inter-racial marriage statistics comparing the desirability of the opposite sex are both in agreement. Between white, asian and black- its black women at the bottom of their gender and asian men at the bottom of theirs. At the other end, highest desirability, black men are above white men and asian women are above white women. So, while marriage does still stick mostly within racial groups, black men marry out of their group well over twice as much as black women, asian women marry out of theirs more than three times as much as asian men. Interesting to speculate why that all is but its undeniably true.

But I think the problem for black women in the US is rooted in entrenched poverty, not desirability. The social structure for african-americans was under pressure back in 1965 when 25% of african-american births were to single mothers. Now its climbed to 75%, its a monumental social catastrophe.

Men can do two things, they can get a woman pregnant and abandon her in the role as care giver and they can, by virtue of physical strength and less tangible connection to offspring, walk/work out of poverty and leave the woman behind. In that respect black american women have some kinship with women from eastern Europe after the collapse of the USSR, where former soviet states experienced young male flight to western nations. My point is that what ultimately caused those women from eastern Europe to be abandoned by their own men was not their desirability, it was their poverty both genders found themselves in.

If I was to be utterly brutal about it, and I will probably get slammed to hell for writing it this way, I would say that while raising self esteem via feeling more desirable may make a woman feel better, in the short term, it need not be a road up where she is better valued, it can as easily and possibly even more commonly be a path to hell leaving her pregnant and abandoned.

DadWasHere you don't know what you are talking about. I suggest you read W E Du Bois who explores the make up of African American families and why there is above average number of single parent households.

Also read this its a quick summation of desirability politics.

mediadiversified.org/2013/11/05/who-stole-all-the-black-women-from-britain/

Also your whole to be brutally honest and Controversial long essay inbound (dons steel hat) to preface bullshit theories which have been thoroughly debunked is pathetic.

I can completely see the points being made about the silencing of experience and the expression of feminism by women of colour and that they are important, very relevant arguments. Reclaiming sexuality and explicit expression of same in all media - whether that be music, film, tv shows or books - isn't something to be stifled or that will necessarily be viewed as acceptable. It shouldn't be made to be when the status quo is fixated on male sexuality and desire. I don't think twerking is disgusting, nor does being comfortable with being an explicitly sexual woman make you a whore. Fgs.

The issue I have is I feel that about the wider context - dancehall for example - but I struggle to understand the specific view of NM as expressing Black Feminism when she's making money from songs like 'You a stupid hoe' and 'shakin' it 4 daddy' - there is so much objectification and frequent sentiments like 'I eat bitches', not exactly pro woman. I see a lot about her as a desirable, sexual woman but as the desirable woman, denigrating other women and placing value on getting the man above any other sentiment. A lot of alpha bitching and playing into female stereotypes.
I can't speak for other women, but being told I'm a stupid hoe and didn't get the prize because I didn't shake it enough for daddy doesn't really make me feel I'm engaging in a message of feminism.
I'm not trying to say any other way but mine is wrong, I try to learn as much as I can, I change my mind, I'm going to get Ain't I a woman and read more but in this specific instance I don't understand how what she's selling is feminist rather than sex. I can agree with Fauch's points in isolation but I can't marry them with the wider context of her work and agree.
I'm interested in the views of people more familiar with her and black feminists because I don't know if I'm just interpreting it wildly differently from their pov or just showing myself deeply ignorant - probable!
As an aside it's Sir Mix-a-lot, not MC Hammer. Mc Hammer is he of the harem pants that you can't touch.