Why You Treat Me So Bad

You know, one of the greatest things I enjoy is talking to you all about some of these blog topics. I enjoy some of the topics and off-thoughts that people bring to the table. Those thoughts and ideas lead to some wonderful conversations. I would like to present one of those thoughts here.

One of my good friends, let's call her "Tia", was speaking out in response to yesterday's blog. She was commenting that a lot of guys are lashing out at that song, and all of it may not be justified. She doesn't believe that men should gripe and complainwhen women make songs like that while women are being "hated" on time after time in numerous songs. I listened to what Miss Tia had to say, but I have some issues with all of what she was saying.

First off, I do not believe that women are being HATED in very many songs. DEGRADED, heck yea, but not hated. Degredation is bad as well, but it seemed as though the crux of her arguement was about woman-hating. A lot of times, so-called woman-hating songs end up being retaliation songs for certain man-hating songs. No Scrubs, Bills, Bills, Bills, and even Irreplaceable have retaliation songs (as seems to be the trend with songs. One gender makes a song, the other retaliates.). Also, a lot of times, men don't pull these songs out until confronted with the initial man-hater jam. Dudes weren't rockin' that "pigeon" nonsense until Scrubs were diagnosed.

Tia also went on to speak about the songs where the artists (usually male) do these female degrading songs that get a lot of play in the club. We are to take the brunt of culpability for marketing this, citing videos like Tip Drill and artists like Luke. Also having grown up in New Orleans, Miss Tia knows a good bit about the rampant degredation in bounce music (note, I never denied the degredation). I looked at this premise rather carefully, and saw a glaring inconsistency. Being in the production side of music, I know that a lot of artists and record companies put out what the BUYING public wants to hear. Statistics show that females purchase albums more than males. Look at your TV's and see which videos rappers put out from their albums. If they are lucky to get off more than one video, somewhere in there will involve a softer side. DMX, Method Man, LL Cool J, Jay-Z, Nas, Nelly, Eminem, all of them. They would do songs that would show a softer side to them that would appeal to the ladies. Wonder why Usher sells so much? Nope.

That's going off on a tangent. Back to the lecture @ hand. I was thinking about being at Kenny's and all the adventures within. Women rushing to dance to Ha-Sizzle exclaiming "she rode that dick like a soldier" (dang, I pick on that song too much, lol). Dancing to songs called "Wiggle Bitch", "Bend Over", "Pop That Pussy", and the like. Tia's comment intrigued me. I thought about it and saw that it may be a glaring difference in either the demographic or the taste in music. I played my bounce remix of Frankie Beverly and Maze's "Joy and Pain". Guess what happened? The room cleared, save abotu 5 old school lovers who started bus stopping for all 6 minutes of the song! I love it. Anyway, I went back to the "degredation" and they came RUNNING in, looking for a speaker to hold, a wall to catch, and a place to sweat. Are the men who make the songs guilty of degredation? Yes. Are the WOMEN who make bounce songs ("drop ya dog ho", chanted by Dyme Gyrl Drell, for instance) guilty of female degredation? Yes.

However, I'm a realist to know that people will continue to put out whatever people will buy/buy into/demand. I know that a VAST majority of guys wiill have the raunchy dance songs BECAUSE women will dance to them. I will admit. When I was in 9th-10th grade, that's what I thought. As a DJ, that's just the way it is. We provide our audience with what they wanna hear.

Sidebar for a minute. You know what I find interesting? The women will be hoes on record, but as soon as there is a live performance by the SAME artist, they use the term "ladies". It then becomes "my n-ggas" and "my ladies". "WHERE THE LADIES AT?!" is a COMMON staple of a lot of the hip-hop shows I've seen that spit the "popular" degrading music. Do artists become a trifle more polite when they are performing live? Hmmmmm...

To wrap this up, I DO agree with Tia's comment about a lot of popular music coming from male artists being degrading to women. My comment is how do we change that? We must change the people, because if they like what they like, they WILL find someone willing to sell into that idea. Must be the allure of music. Chris Rock spoke out about this topic during his latest stand up, "Never Scared". He said that women would dance to the nastiest music as long as it had a good beat. Although the artist would be saying "smack her with a dick", she would dance her tail off, thinking "he ain't talkin' bout me!!" I don't know. Haven't been, never will be female, so I can't vouch for that statement. I DO know that there is a HIGH percentage of people (read: guys) that will buy into the genre if they feel that it produces a favorable result from women (references numerous bedroom songs and "mood music"). Different music for different environments, I guess. Make it do what it do, baby.

*runs dat beat*

-B