The music industry has taken a wrong turn, and it affects our new generation; music videos becoming more like pornographic trailers causing men and women to objectify each other as a sex object. According to Camille Paglia (lecturer, educator, and feminist) in “Lady Gaga and The Death of Sex,” “Hollywood discovered that sex was great box office” (2). Because sex sells, it is a market technique used by record companies to sell more record. So does sex usage really empower women? In Paglia’s article, “Madonna I: Animality and Artifice,” she claims that dominatrix (used by Madonna) empowers women, and it should be praised by all female musicians (89). I agree to Paglia’s claim that sexuality sometimes empower rather than exploit women to act sluttish; however, in music, I believe the line between a woman using sexuality and promoting herself as an object is unnoticed because it changes depend on who dominate. When male musicians dominate a certain type of genre (hip-hop), many new musicians (women included) degrade women to jumpstart their career because sex sell.
For instance, before Nicki Minaj gets famous, she started her career by degrading women in her mix tape, “Sucka Free,” cover picture because most people think hip-hop is only male profession, and it has little respect for women because mostly men listen to hip-hop. And so for female rappers to get the attention from those men, she has to jumpstart her career by using her sex appeal image. In addition to her degrading cover pose, that might caused young women in our society to accept it as a norm, she was criticized by many because that posture was not only inappropriate, but it was copied from Lil’ Kim. In fact, it was the same pose Lil' Kim uses on one of her older cover...
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...a blame Gaga for killing sex.
Personally, I think Paglia argument that blames Gaga for not being sexy did not explain enough about Gaga who know how to play piano, write music, sing great live, dance, and make fashion (Needham 2). It mostly comparison to her “long-term crush” (Needham 2) Madonna who is, as Paglia stated, “the future of feminism” (“Madonna I: Animality and Artifice” 90) now seems “marooned in the past” (Needham 2). Overall Gaga is empowering everyone respect each other and love themselves, unlike Rihanna who exploiting women to be a slave for men. I believe Rihanna not only degrading women but also exploiting kids by sing to them inappropriate song for their age. Regardless if number of musicians like Rihanna increase, I think Gaga will accomplish far more success than musicians who choose to follow rather than lead.
In his most recent album, Kanye West raps, “Now if I fuck this model/ And she just bleached her asshole/ And I get bleach on my T-shirt/ I 'mma feel like an asshole.” He suggests that it is the girl’s fault for getting bleach on his tee shirt, which she only did to make herself more sexually appealing. This misogyny in hip-hop culture is recognized to bring about problems. For instance, the women around these rappers believe they can only do well in life if they submit themselves to the men and allow themselves to be cared for in exchange for physical pleasure. In her essay, “From Fly-Girls to Bitches and Hoes”, Joan Morgan argues that the same rap music that dehumanizes women can be a powerful platform for gender equality if implemented correctly.
Leonard, Marion. Gender in the Music Industry: Rock, Discourse and Girl Power. Hampshire: Ashgate Publishing Company, Aug. 2007.
... it brought in sultry rhythms and made some adults worried about over-sexualizing music. However, today it is very common to hear something sexual in a song or verse. In today’s music industry, many women are just as successful as the men.
Since young girls today spend more time surfing the web, they are exposed to more mainstream advertisements that boast sexual content, and as a result, many girls want to do the things they are seeing young girls just like Winifred do. In addition to exposure to sexual content on the internet, the music of popular culture leaves very little to the imagination. Women in these music videos are more often shown as provocative and wearing revealing clothing. Many girls look up to these women and want to emulate them because they are their favorite artist. For instance, Beyoncé’s album “Beyoncé” features the song “Partition”, where Beyoncé says “He Monica Lewinski all on my gown”. The sexual reference to Monica Lewinski is hypersexu...
The objectification of women in the media and women voluntarily subjecting themselves to this demeaning objectification is rapidly increasing in lieu of feminist ideals and a new age push for women empowerment. The media has long capitalized on women’s sexuality in everything from music videos to manipulative advertisements, appealing to the male gaze while simultaneously instilling a sense of longing in girls of all ages to look like these women. In Lily Allen’s song, “Hard Out Here”, she attempts to bring light to this issue of women being treated as simply sexual objects and how all women are expected to look and act. However, in contrast to her empowering lyrics, Allen’s video takes a turn for the worst when she implements strictly black female dancers as representation of the cliché sexism found in music videos placing them at the butt of the parody.
It is clearly seen that rappers are only doing this to achieve success and of course the great amount of fame. When composing raps, “it is painfully clear that women are mere sex objects” (Bobo 1). In the rap world, and even in the hip-hop world, women are viewed as accessories and are not given the respect they deserve. The single reason this is done is simply for the rappers to make money. Many songs in 2015 clearly, with no shame, violate women. In Kendrick Lamar’s famous interlude rap “Buried Alive”, he says “We talk casually about the industry and how the women be the taste makers for the shit we making”. That visibly shouts women how extremely useable women are when rapper create their lyrics. That rap was featured on Drake’s album Take Care. Drake is one of the most famous and well-known rappers of today. That album made millions and Drake gained so many fans. That is just one of the many ways famous people can easily get the human populations attentions and support in what they are
In contrast, today’s popular music is of a secular origin. Some types of contemporary music mirror the decline in our value system. The “pop” or “hip-hop” culture is characterized by explicit sexuality, habitual use of profanity, and depiction of extreme violence in music and all other forms of entertainme...
The rappers their approach was that people listened to them and their clothes were more colorful. With the times the styles were changing already and they become more liberals they began to dress the women in sensual clothes usually the colors of their clothes is black and they teach their bodies so that the people look more their videos. The rappers use the women as a sexual object that they can handle. Rap music all women who are beautiful are the ones who come out in these videos because it is the appearances that matter to them and they want to give to understand that the women have to show their body to make money. A research by Biancawade state "A study done at McKinley Senior High School 2009 has shown that 67% of students feel that women are represented as sex objects in music videos. Eight- four percent feel as though there is more to a woman than her physical features but the media still depicts females as sexual objects." The quote state the most of the young people from high school believe the women is a sex object and that makes them think they can be used all women just as an object of pleasure. Most all women would like to have a good body and be able to dress like those models to get everything they want and is what today the rappers are no longer so popular in the lyrics of the music if not the pretty women who come
However others female hip-hop artist, such as Lil Kim or Rihanna, have decided to provide no resistance towards the deleterious depictions of women in their music and in turn sometimes exploit themselves. Due to her extreme fame, success,
Madonna also presents Eve’s figure in a dual presentation: the angel-like virgin and the seductive sinner, in 1984, when Madonna promote her album Like a Virgin, she dressed as a bride with white silk wedding dress, push up bra, fish net stockings and a belt that said “boy toy” on it, which she argues that she’s not labeling herself as “boy toy”, but instead she have the ability to own a “boy toy”. In 1986, Madonna’s video for Open Your Heart she wore a pointy-tasseled bra with short platinum hair and dark eyebrows, the outfit resembles the darker aspect of Eve, which is the femme fatale, “a description usually associated with women who use sex to exert power” (1159). Madonna brought tight bustiers, revealing corsets and the era of the underwear as outwear at The Blonde Ambition period of the 1990s, which the archetype of Eve transform to “the woman who inappropriately dares to reveal her unmentionables, what Nathan Joseph calls the final buffer between the public layers of clothing and the privacy of the nude” (1158). Even after ten years later, Madonna still presents the femme fatale in her performances, “The female fatale is perhaps the most enduring of all images used by Madonna”
The phrase sex sales is used a lot in America, our society doesn't think women can sale things strictly on their talent alone. So they over sexualize them while they are promoting or preforming. The ascribed identity here is that women aren't as talented as men and have to work on more provocative marketing measures to sell their records. While as a woman I think they ascribed identify is obtuse however, living up to it has one big perk. That is when a woman dresses how society thinks she needs to she tends to sell more tickets than she normally would. While if a man decided to do that it would back fire. Let's give some examples of men and women in both industries living up to the identities the media place on them.
Young, impressionable males do not understand what the subliminal messages in popular music videos are. Subconsciously, boys think that they understand what rock and rap videos are saying. The children do not understand that producers, directors and the artists, work as a team to strategically use camera angles, positioning, poses and sexual innuendoes to make their point. In fact, according to Kathleen Turkel, an assistant professor of women’s studies at the University of Massachusetts, “The fantasy world of rock videos is not innocent or accidental, but it is a carefully designed advertising technique used to sell CD’s, tapes and videos to a target audience of 14 to 34 year-old consumers.” (Rhodes) The final result of all of these messages is a very skewed image of who and what women are. Young girls viewing these videos is actually quite disturbing because what they watch on television is what they will grow up wanting to become. With all of these graphic images allowed on television, is it any wonder why we have horrible rape cases and other sexual assault crimes?
Women need to act sooner rather than later because in recent years the rap industry has become more and more sexual. Rap is critiqued so harshly because many rap artists take the exploitation of women to the next level. In his music video for “Tip Drill” Nelly swiped a credit card down a woman’s backside. Rap crosses the line more so than any other genre. Not only are women portrayed sexually in the music videos, but also in the rap songs themselves. The lyrics are explicit and usually go into great detail when they describe sexual acts. During an interview Nelly was asked why rap gets such hard criticism he replied with: “Part of the reason rap artists come under fire more than any other group is because people don’t respect what we do as art. When actress Halle Berry...
Music is an inspirational outlet that can be used to convey a message to other people who relate to that message. Music can become even stronger when the person who is performing it is an inspirational source as well. For the past 30 years Madonna has become a well-known artist, actress, and role model to the people who support her. All artists know that they are only number one until someone else comes along and replaces them with more intriguing work to offer. Lady Gaga has been said to be the new Madonna of our generation and is quite often compared to her in many ways by her musical and styling choices. They both share similarities such as their musical genre, style, feminine empowerment, and their support towards the gay community. Their differences can also be seen in those same fields as well.