Eminem comes for gender nonsense - low pushback

[fromorbit]

His new single Houdini which has 15 million views already is pretty scathing with jokes about transitioning cats. Pretty catchy:

Like other male stars who question this stuff Gervais, Chapelle, Alice Cooper etc he won't get seriously cancelled. Indeed interestingly even though his position is blatant in the song a lot of press so far does not even mention it. The main focus is talking about Eminem dissing Megan Thee Stallion, which is fairly typical for him see what he said about Britney, Christina Aguilera etc.

Eminem has a genderfluid them daughter Stevie which Eminem clearly thinks is nonsense. However the daughter APPEARS in the video with her two sisters to look shocked and get it more views. So Dad can misgender away apparently.

The BBC article on his return doesn't even mention any of this. Remember women artists were treated as pariahs for just questioning any of this.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/clee3445w0lo

Even more telling is the Pink News article. Remember how insane the coverage Pink News was of JKR. Here Eminem gets treated as basically a bit of a edgy jokester rather than a person triggering a trans genocide.

Eminem takes swipe at RuPaul and Megan Thee Stallion on new single ‘Houdini’
https://www.thepinknews.com/2024/05/31/eminem-houdini-megan-the-stallion-rupaul-trans/

I am not sidelining Eminem's own love of edgy women hate here. He has said a bunch of repellent stuff, but cancelling him over it didn't work twenty years ago and is not going to work now. Just noting the massive double standards. Also this suggests the narrative is breaking down a little further.

Some of his lyrics

Young girl by the name of Brenda and I pretend to befriend her
Sit down beside her like a spider, hi there girl you mighta
Heard of me before, see whore you're the kinda girl that I'da
Assault and rape and figure why not try to make your pussy wider
Fuck you with an umbrella then open it up while that shits inside ya

^^

Yeah, you could argue that he’s just getting into the mind of a rapist, it’s not really how he thinks. It’s clever! His fans aren’t getting that deep though. He knows what sells.

Those lyrics are written from the pov of a character. Lots of creatives write horrible points of view, but it's not memoir. You're kind of missing that point and about on par with the woman shouted at Leslie Grantham because Den cheated on Angie.

I think a lot of people who are what you might call "woke" struggle with how to respond to guys lime Eminem, and some of the others like Chappelle mentioned above.

They can't quite manage to renounce them, because they feel the need to elevate certain types of people and certain types of music, as part of their vision of themselves as cool and with it and in the know. A guy known as bad boy rap royalty would not be someone they could be critical of. Nor a black sweary comic who's broadly on the liberal.

So they just pretend that the bad thing didn't happen.

Shady is back!!!! 😄😄
This is hilarious - yesterday I randomly saw a comment dissing Eminem's new track, saying it wasn't that great. But it didn't really say why. And I thought oh, Eminem's got a new track out. So I listen to it on Spotify and was like hey it's pretty good ... hang on... Is he dissing trans stuff?? 😲
So I go looking for the actual music video on YouTube. Hahaha love the concept of Eminem facing off Slim Shady and trying to stop his alternate persona from getting him cancelled. 😂😂 I cackled when Shady turned up in the Bud Light t-shirt going WTF 😂😂

It's one of those videos and songs that you have to watch and listen to repeatedly as there's always things you'll find.

23 million views in a couple of days!

Ah I love hip-hop - yes there's plenty of horrible lyrics against women, which is jarring if you don't listen to that kind of music. The genre is pretty much defined by its trash talking, glorifying violence against each other and sexist abuse of women. It's basically about (usually young) men mouthing off at each other trying to prove they are better than their competitors and can use any women they want, including their opponents' partners, because they are so famous and cool that women will want to have sex with them.
That's pretty much the premise of most of these songs lol

'struggle with how to respond to guys'

Because its guys.

I've watched with my own eyes how Billy Bragg responds to men compared to how he responds to women. Many of the people who are enthusiastic trans rights activists are there because at base the movement is motivated by very deep seated anti women feelings and ideas.

It's a delightful vehicle for some men to get to shout at women.

While pretending to be the good chaps.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/clee3445w0lo

BBC angle.

It's recognised that actors can play evil characters without being seen as evil themselves, also the people that write the scripts. Somehow when it's rappers, people lose the ability to tell the difference between reality and the song.

Eminem has had homophobic lyrics but is well known to not have any problem with homosexuality. Eminem/Slim Shady is a character that Marshall plays but for some reason so many people can't work that out.

Bit of a tangent but I find it really interesting how Eminem has been embraced by younger Zoomers/older Alphas.

My 12 year old DD is well entranced by this SZA cover of Eminem:

https://variety.com/2024/music/news/eminem-reacts-sza-cover-lose-yourself-1236021172/amp/

Y2K is alive and well in our house 😆

That's selling 'his fans' short and assuming they're all a bit hard of critical thinking though. Judging by this thread, some people on here are fans; are they 'not getting that deep' either?

I’m a fan 🤷‍♀️

there’s a fair bit on the internet from fans analysing lyrics, and getting very deep. For instance the song quoted below- apparently “Brenda” is a reference to a Tupac song and isn’t directly about rape, but abortion.

i would argue that Eminem’s fans are the one’s who don’t take it as face value. Everyone I know that dislikes him does so because of the face value- he’s homophobic, raps about hitting women etc, and can’t see the deeper relevance.

after all, Stephen Fry once called him “The Shakespeare of our generation”

You are underestimating millions of people.

Is it lonely up there on that high horse?

This reminds me of a version of this tune I heard where it said 'im gonna reach out and stab ya?!'
Ive not heard Eminem for years but this is quite funny this tune.

I've always had a soft spot for old Eminem. I've never quite understood the confusion between the persona and the artist; it's a bit like Bowie I suppose. Good to see him still breaking barriers aged 51 (!!)

I have always liked him.

A decent father that raised 3 daughters mostly on his own, including two who are not his bio kids and seemed to have managed to give them a good education and keep them grounded. Also very honest about his drug and alcohol use and how that almost destroyed him. Did a lot to discover and support other artists too.

I have always seen him as a clown who likes to shock and just goes after anyone, including celebs and politicians, who takes themselves too seriously and even himself with his lyrics.

Will some people find his lyrics tasteless and offensive? absolutely. But people have a choice not to listen to him.

Eminem is a character - he doesn’t really think his kid is a spoilt brat and telling her to fuck off etc.

These lyrics are no different to watching a horror movie about a violent killer or even rape.

Why do we allow films and books to portray these things but then want to cancel music.

He is a character, like a character from a movie or book and he’s no different to other characters like Taylor Swift.

He just chooses to say the most awful things to get a reaction, like thriller books and horror movies do, whilst the Taylor Swifts choose to say and do things that they think their audience wants to hear.

I completely agree.

FWIW if Brenda is in reference to the same Brenda as Tupac raps about, which it possibly is.

She was a 12 year old girl who was taken advantage of by her cousin because she was emotionally much younger than her years (ND? - It says in the song she’s barely got a brain and can hardly spell her own name) and he raped her.

She became pregnant and got kicked out and so had to become a prostitute to feed her baby and then was murdered by a client.

Its an incredibly song with powerful words and something that was a common thing for people like Tupac growing up.

Tupac is an incredible rapper and has some amazing songs and I know Eminem is a massive fan of his.

The fact that Eminem is referring to Brenda is quite shocking but clever/funny too as he’s talking about a very vulnerable young girl which makes the lyrics even more shocking, which is exactly what he’s after.

I've listened to this new track a few times now. It's brilliant. Eminem is clever as ever with his mix of bravado, vulnerability, humour and unexpected twists and shocks. I'm curious to see how it goes down - feels a bit like he's thrown down a gauntlet.

Rap is my thing. It transports me. I love it and the history of Rap & Hip Hop and whilst Tupac is my absolute idol (would have loved to see what that man achieved if he had still been alive), Eminem is, to me, a genius. He tells stories with his music, he creates characters both evil and good. A white man coming from nothing to become the best rapper ever in what remains a black genre without pretence or delusions of what he is.

His lyrics are not to be taken literally and it's idiocy that people think they are. It's often a cartoon take on current affairs.

Houdini is fabulous. It's sentimental, it's current, it's funny and the video is brilliant. I'm looking forward to the album.

Guess who's back....

his lyrics highlight issues. It gets people talking about the issues and brings them into focus. Shady is violent against women, but all that does is highlight the horribleness of domestic violence. He never manages to glorify it, the subtext is always that it’s bad.* in mumsnet terms his characters are almost a reverse. Tells one side of a story in a way intended to get everyone thinking about and supporting the other side. Iyswim.*

Does this mean you can interpret that he's not GC though? If his misogynistic and homophobic comments are reverses, does that not mean his GC ones are too? Especially if he does have experience of it in his family?

He might just be setting up a conversation/debate, to provoke and to make people think. We don't have to read his personal sentiments into it so literally. Like with all art.

I love (some) hip-hop too, and it's far from all defined by 'trash-talking'. But I've never been a big MM fan, never bought his records. Of course I've heard a few of the big hits of the past. The track is OK, but Jeez, Abracadabra is the cheesiest song in the world; I thought I'd heard the last of it decades ago!

He might just be setting up a conversation/debate, to provoke and to make people think. We don't have to read his personal sentiments into it so literally. Like with all art.

Yes that's what I meant, he's known for being provocative so this song doesn't necessarily mean he is (or isn't) a GC ally, he's controversially raising provocative issues.

I doubt MM’s various characters agree with each other, let alone anyone else.

The great thing about this song is that it smashes a big hole into what remains of the defences of ‘no debate’.

As for being ‘GC’, well, the vast majority of people agree that humans can’t change sex and that single sex spaces, sports and services will always be necessary/relevant, whereas only a small percentage of people are actually gender critical, as in, routinely applying critical thought to gendered stereotypes/gender roles.

He’s a lyrical genius 🎵