CHRIS BROWN

so glad this guy's career is "over" lol

oddly I only caught like the last minute or so of his tribute and was like "wtf is going on, he isn't even singing!"

I have absolutely zero doubt that it was a moment of genuine emotion that is rapidly being spun into a publicity stunt.

haha same here xpost

I don't think it has anything to do with expressing remorse - I grew up in a house with a dude who abused women - agree "fuck Chris Brown" but on the basis of what I experienced personally growing up & what I later learned when I went into the psych biz, the shame & guilt these guys experience (nb: the presence of shame & guilt doesn't mean "therefore you have to give them a break, look how bad they feel") is some take-total-possession-of-your-being stuff - this is largely, make no mistake, a function of narcissism, but what that means is that a big old crying breakdown is the opposite of acting for these guys, kinda

fact is that he tried to be part of the MJ tribute on the same awards show a year ago, as part of his initial damage control/career revival and was rebuffed, and it's pretty impossible for him to pick a song like "Man In The Mirror" and for it to not feel like a big deliberate statement. so even if the emotions were real, he's acted like too much of a petulant, unrepentant child who doesn't see what the big deal is about what he did in the past year and a half for me to feel anything for him. it's like yeah, look at the man in the mirror, Chris, he's a talentless dipshit.

I don't think "he is acting" and "he is faking it" are equivalent statements.

Because yeah, as some dude points out picking "Man in the Mirror" as the focal point of your tribute after having the year he's had is saying WAAAAAAY more about Chris Brown than it is about Michael Jackson, and what's it's saying is "I am using a tribute that is supposed to be about a dead legend to tell everyone that I'm really sorry and not a petulant self-absorbed brat who wants everything to be in service of me."

The tears, I'm sure, were completely genuine, but they also feed directly into that self-involved narrative.

The tears, I'm sure, were completely genuine, but they also feed directly into that self-involved narrative.

Yes! this is true. but I mean, that doesn't make the pain from which they spring any less real/felt. I don't know I mean obv. I'm too close to some of this stuff to really be open to probably colder/more realistic readings but when I watch that clip of dude unable to sing I think "wow, it may be that you deserve to suffer, CB, but you're for sure getting the full measure"

At any rate, if CB really wanted to do a Jackson tribute he should have just danced and not tried to sing any ballads whatsoever since he can't really sing.

but isn't that "pain" and remorse and the tears just self-pity? "look at the man in the mirror" and see a marginalized and wasted career, not "look in the man in the mirror" and see someone who did wrong by beating his girlfriend?

if you really want to see the disconnect between critics and pop audiences you should have seen the "FUCK CHRIS BROWN" sentiment from every rock writer I follow on Twitter vs. the "OH MAN CHRIS BROWN WAS AMAZING" from pretty much everyone else on Twitter when you searched "Chris Brown"

yeah the choice of song material seems totally self-serving and narcissistic, kinda self-defeating no matter how genuine his breakdown is. it's both genuine and horribly cynical at the same time...

otoh wtf dude you can't even make it through the song/you stopped singing? I thought you were supposed to be a pro, that ain't no pro shit.

but isn't that "pain" and remorse and the tears just self-pity? "look at the man in the mirror" and see a marginalized and wasted career, not "look in the man in the mirror" and see someone who did wrong by beating his girlfriend?

The point being made (which I agree with) is that the depth of emotion is genuine regardless of how shitty the motivation for it; dude may be crying because everyone hates him more so than because he's a brat with itchy fists but that doesn't mean he isn't really upset.

Maybe you don't learn from self-pity but you sure as hell can hurt from it.

but isn't that "pain" and remorse and the tears just self-pity? "look at the man in the mirror" and see a marginalized and wasted career, not "look in the man in the mirror" and see someone who did wrong by beating his girlfriend?

no, man, not as far as I know, not "just" anyway - a lot of abusers (I can't say "most," but: a lot) hate the shit out of themselves - they know they're monsters, they wish they weren't, but they don't have the inner means to get right - they can sort of tell that the damage they took at some point has fucked them up for good - "self-horror," more like, which, right, is still "limitless self-regard," no doubt - but I mean - most people this fucked up, if there were a way they could make the trade quickly before their narcissism got a chance to talk them out of it, would give up their legs to not be how they are. their lives are very nearly as unpleasant as those of the people whose lives they wreck. that is the paradox of having survived abuse: you have to know, because you saw it first-hand, that the abuser was basically a big pulsating ball of self-hate whose need to not feel helpless couldn't be satisfied except at the expense of the people around him.

i really am sad that the convicted woman-beater's tribute to the alleged child molester couldn't go on without something weird happening

(really the most upsetting thing about this is that this means Chris Brown is going to be back on the radio this fall instead of quietly enrolling in college classes)

maybe you haven't paid much attention to the last 18 months or whatever, but Chris Brown hasn't shown a lot of self-hatred or shame, mostly he's acted kind of perplexed and annoyed anytime someone fails to buy his album or play his song on the radio now

lol Whiney

actually I will applaud Chris Brown's cast-iron nuts if he releases a song that features the line "girl we can beat this thing/together"

well he did do "smooth criminal" last night didn't he?

lol some dude what you see publicly from somebody is maybe what % of what's going on with them, do you suppose - but yr right, I only think about this stuff when it crests my radar i.e. when the guy goes off the rails somehow

okay maybe I should actually watch this thing rather than read reactions about it and form STRONG OPINIONS off of that because if he also did "Smooth Criminal" that is so smh that I'm likely to decapitate myself

i will say that none of this was as fun as last year when chris brown/dj khaled committed suicide live on TV

Don't you guys pay any attention at all to how media narratives work? It goes - rise to stardom>>triumph>>fall from grace>>redemption/comeback

― One of the Most High Profile Comedy Directors of the 90s (Shakey Mo Collier), Friday, March 6, 2009 12:49 AM (1 year ago) Bookmark

I would just like to say "hey me, way to be OTM"

lol some dude what you see publicly from somebody is maybe what % of what's going on with them, do you suppose - but yr right, I only think about this stuff when it crests my radar i.e. when the guy goes off the rails somehow

― get your bucket of free wings (underrated aerosmith albums I have loved), Monday, June 28, 2010 2:25 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

i agree that you never get the full story with just what the public sees, i'm just saying judging all of his public actions/statements as a whole makes more sense than analyzing just one incident divorced from the context of all the other things they've done and said

hahaha okay so they did the "annie are you okay" bit of "smooth criminal" so that chris brown didn't have to say "i'm a smooth criminal"

are you sure it wasn't like "rih-annie are you okay?"

i was gonna say

"robyn, are you okay? are you okay, robyn?"

The whole Chris Brown/Rihanna thing, from the finger-wagging cultural critics, to the gathering of comments from other musicians and friends, to publicly deconstructing every move he makes in the context of that whole incident, is wretched.

I'm not going to go out on a limb (that will immediately get lopped off) and make any claims to knowing about the guy outside of public persona and highly publicized actions, but has there been any indication that he has a history of being violent to women (or at all)? I mean, no one gets a freebie when it comes to battering the hell out of someone, but painting a scarlet letter on the guy and acting like there's no redemption for anyone who fucks up or room for anyone who's screwed up but has tried to make amends isn't going to help. Portraying someone as a fucked-up woman batterer and telling them that's who they are isn't really helping anyone.

but has there been any indication that he has a history of being violent to women

the jury of his peers that convicted him is a starter

dude beat a woman. he is a woman-beater.

I have never beat a woman, and I have "fucked up or screwed up" a lot of things

also as some dude pointed out, his complete failure to comport himself with any sort of dignity, let alone express remotely adequate contrition, since the incident doesn't exactly help his cause

mean, no one gets a freebie when it comes to battering the hell out of someone, but painting a scarlet letter on the guy and acting like there's no redemption for anyone who fucks up or room for anyone who's screwed up but has tried to make amends isn't going to help.

i think tons of people (incl ppl posting itt) were willing and in some cases (probably mine, since i liked him a lot as an artist) eager to NOT paint him with a scarlet letter for doing what he did, but all of his actions from the incident on have been completely petulant, and as ship said, pretty much annoyed at the fact that he had to address the situation publicly and that some people (radio programmers, journalists, fans) were now looking at him in a different light because of what he did

my understanding is that he grew up with a violent father and that this was the first recorded instance of him hitting anyone, let alone hitting a woman

I agree that he can and should be able to get past this; part of doing that is, for example, not being pissy about people being wary of his records in the immediate aftermath and not turning tributes to Michael Jackson into pontification platforms about himself

And you know, I'm all for redemption and all, but dude fucked up royally and barely had any repercussions so far.

Like he basically beat up a woman and got MORE famous: a Vibe cover story, top billing on TV Award Shows, spending the weekend jet-skiing with Diddy. No one in the industry even took a stand against him but Jay-Z.

Dude hasn't suffered, afaik. Give dude a 10-year radio blackout and then maybe I'll listen to his dipshit crocodile tears.

No one in the industry even took a stand against him but Jay-Z

really? I didn't hear about this - good on ya Jay

you're kind of right, but 'graffiti' is a flop in the context of his career

yeah shakey, last year at the BET awards there was a michael jackson tribute, but jay-z threatened to not perform at the awards if chris brown was included in the tribute

or so it was said

I agree that he can and should be able to get past this; part of doing that is, for example, not being pissy about people being wary of his records in the immediate aftermath and not turning tributes to Michael Jackson into pontification platforms about himself

I agree, I think it is his attitude towards the incident which has put people off as much as the incident itself -- he expected saying sorry to make everything okay, and has acted angry and butthurt ever since when his album didn't do as well as he expected it to. No one is owed record sales.

xpost A commercial flop, yes, but artists don't make any money on record sales anyway anymore

Also Jay-Z apparently said, “Chris is a walking dead man.”

his career will likely be nonexistent w/ in 3-5 years, pre-beating was on track to have an usher-like career

his career will likely be nonexistent w/ in 3-5 years

this is true of most r&b/pop stars tbf

right, but it's only true for CB because of the beating

i don't think Chris was ever really gonna be at Usher level, at least not longevity-wise

i mean he had a streak of very successful singles, but he was never going to have the highest selling album of the year like Confessions and totally be king of the hill.

Even though I hated half his songs it's pretty much undeniable that dude was being groomed for supermegastardom; he'd had a successful introduction into the world of black cinema and sold a shit-ton of records and was dating the woman everyone wanted to bone. Basically about the only thing he could have done to fuck everything up was... beat the shit out of her and then wonder why wearing a gaudy necklace that said "OOPS!" in cartoon font pissed people off. Which he did.

xp yeah maybe not, but it's wrong to say that his career hasn't suffered at all

can we talk about Usher's deal with Satan, btw? like why the hell does everyone love "OMG" THAT much?