Is SPIN really circling the drain?

http://www.ebony.com/entertainment-culture/whats-so-bad-about-lupes-latest-single-622

He goes on to reiterate Hogan’s assertion that the song is guilty of “mansplaining,” but in the very next sentence asks “but does any female want to be called "a lady"?

Son.

This is what happens when a person who is far removed from someone else’s world decides not only to peek in, but also tries to narrate from the outside. Speaking as an Actual Black Woman, not Race Non Specific Pretend Woman referenced in this article, I can tell you that the word “female” is a far greater point of contention than “lady” amongst sisters. And while plenty of women eschew the word “lady” or the expectation that one has to be “ladylike” to be respectable, others still cling tightly to the term and the traits. “Female,” however, is a term often hurled from the same lips that favor “b*tch.”

I don’t care how hip-hop ‘approved’ you are, how many Eightball and MJG tapes you have from seventh grade or even if you bothered to take an Afro-studies class at whatever liberal arts college that taught you how to wax poetic about Dipset, you are on the outside.

dang

This is White privilege at its finest: being able to complain that there aren’t enough narratives about Black death and pain on the Pop stations, without being touched by said death and pain outside of one’s headphones or whatever corny hipster bar one goes to drink artisanal beer and nod awkwardly along to Chief Keef.

hammer

boom

thank you jamilah lemieux

the fact that none of that shit seems even to have occurred to anyone at spin is kind of jaw-dropping

lol, was gonna quote those same three passages

there you go, lex!

i would probably like hipster bars with artisanal beer a lot better if they played chief keef

lock thread!

oh wait this is still a spin thread. never mind.

I have not yet heard "B*tch Bad" yet but that response is amazing

man that is some invigorating stuff. makes you feel good to be alive.

piece is entertaining, fraught w/ its own problems tho

do tell whitey!

goddam i'm going to be calling out white ppl all fucking day on ILX feels good man

lmao @ m@tt

lolll

well played matt.
are we gonna have to start saying "the b word" now
*shakes fist angrily* SPIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNN!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKpqyZCH0BI

Brandon detests Rick Ross, lol. Some of that is definitely on point, but it also definitely crosses the line I mentioned above, pulling the outsider card in a way that's ultimately problematic.

i tend not to worry about how problematic something is when my first response to it is: oh thank you.

but that's just me! to me, its invigorating. i wanna read stuff like that every day.

piece is entertaining, fraught w/ its own problems tho

― young money color me badd (J0rdan S.), Monday, August 27, 2012 10:45 AM (46 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

idk i've read through this twice and even though it seems like it should be full of holes given how strongly worded it is i can't find any

My first response to Brandon's piece was "oh, thank you!"...

Speaking as an Actual Black Woman, not Race Non Specific Pretend Woman referenced in this article, I can tell you that the word “female” is a far greater point of contention than “lady” amongst sisters. And while plenty of women eschew the word “lady” or the expectation that one has to be “ladylike” to be respectable, others still cling tightly to the term and the traits. “Female,” however, is a term often hurled from the same lips that favor “b*tch.”

other people have sort of made this point itt, but i still don't think i get it. it didn't seem like brandon chose the word "female" very carefully (really like he was just picking the most prosaic thing possible other than "woman" because y'know that's actually in the song), but why is it 'hurled from the same lips that favor 'bitch''????

i don't know WHY it is but it is, don't know how you've never heard it before

Ironically, this same writer cried earlier this summer that the current dearth of “street rap” on mainstream radio is a bad thing. This is White privilege at its finest: being able to complain that there aren’t enough narratives about Black death and pain on the Pop stations, without being touched by said death and pain outside of one’s headphones or whatever corny hipster bar one goes to drink artisanal beer and nod awkwardly along to Chief Keef.

ok i actually do take issue with this part. why is it impossible that Brandon (or even the hipster stock character) is genuinely affected by the deaths of black people irl? because they're black and he's not?also while i love the 8-ball and mjg tapes thing, i think this part was a little sensitive for a Chief Keef cheap shot.

can't tell you either i guess xp

because female refers to sex, woman refers to gender, one is biological and refers to insects, llamas, xlr jacks, etc, and the other refers to human beings

other people have sort of made this point itt, but i still don't think i get it. it didn't seem like brandon chose the word "female" very carefully (really like he was just picking the most prosaic thing possible other than "woman" because y'know that's actually in the song), but why is it 'hurled from the same lips that favor 'bitch''????

female as a noun is largely about the tone of voice. so if you've never heard a man talk about "a female" in that way then I guess you wouldn't get it. it's basically talking about women like they're animals. female as an adjective isn't so bad, but has been kind of tarnished by the association imo.

agree that the shots at hipsters felt a little cheap, but not enough to undercut the validity of the author's main points or the piece as a whole. i don't reject the insiders/outsiders division being drawn.

and "lady" has the dark history of being associated with Jerry Lewis movies

it's also a pretty huge strawman. i don't know brandon personally but just generally speaking the fact that he's white doesn't mean that he's a hipster who goes to artisanal bars (and all the economic/social implications that go along w/ that characterization)

xp to een

artisanal beer is not really a 'thing,' shouldve gone w/ microbrews

idg why the ebony article tries to tie the "female" issue to race and culture.

"it's basically talking about women like they're animals."

yeah this. pretty common.

idg why the ebony article tries to tie the "female" issue to race and culture.

Because in my experience white guys don't call women "females" in that way?

something i realized a long time ago is that if you're white and you listen to hip hop, there's pretty much no type of hip hop you can listen to that doesn't open you up to an obvious "of course you like THAT kind of hip hop, because you're white and..." potshot. gangsta rap, conscious rap, white rappers, there's a killer zing for all of 'em. and you only invite those if you argue for one type of rap over the other, especially if you do so articulately and/or as a professional critic. sometimes it's a conversation worth having, but it's also pretty frequently exhausting and fruitless.

white racists will often refer to black women as female in the animal/breeder sense. have since the good old slave days.

also while i love the 8-ball and mjg tapes thing, i think this part was a little sensitive for a Chief Keef cheap shot.

Because in my experience white guys don't call women "females" in that way?

Someone hasn't been watching recent seasons of The Real World

(NOTE: I do not recommend watching recent seasons of The Real World)

Because in my experience white guys don't call women "females" in that way?

hmm, ok. not the case in my experience at all. I think it's pretty heavily ingrained in police and military culture. the people I've heard say it that way are pretty uh... I guess "rural" would be the polite way to put it.

Because in my experience white guys don't call women "females" in that way?

Oh dude hang out around frat dudes, cops, stock brokers, etc and you'll hear it plenty.

also while i love the 8-ball and mjg tapes thing, i think this part was a little sensitive for a Chief Keef cheap shot.

you realize this reads like you saying, yeah the older heads are tools of the man but why she gotta be angry at ME
― The muted sensation feels amazeballs. (forksclovetofu), Monday, August 27, 2012 12:03 PM (3 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

no i didn't, probably because in my mind the stereotype of a white guy w/ pretensions to being a real head is still centered around fetishism of 90s gangster rap more than anything else. and ME ftr well i love both

okeydoke

the spin guy should just hang out with more thinkpiece-writing raconteurs who spend their days on hip-hop panels. maybe he'll learn something.

and yeah fair enough wrt the female thing, it honestly isn't something i hear but i can see it taking on a demeaning tone.

as for "lady," some dude's Jerry Lewis joke aside, it really does carry a slight antifeminist connotation for me, almost like 'sweetheart'--like trying to flatter a woman in a way that is actually condescending. but that's obviously the kind of cultural discrepancy the article is pointing out, and i do think it's an amazing piece altogether

the piece also operates with the base position that all gangster rap is harmful/poisonous. based off brandon's writing, he doesn't presume the same about backpack/conscious rap even tho he doesn't like lupe. it also (like lupe's song) ignores every other factor that influences how kids act/think. there's a presumption in the piece (as far criticism of music goes) that if you eradicated waka flocka and 2 chainz and boosie and elevated lupe, the world would be a much better place for kids, and i don't think that's true at all.

skateboards everywhere

there's also just so many false binaries going on, because, like 8Ball is basically a conscious rapper if you actually listen to his albums, and Lupe always makes a big deal of having listened to Ball & G more than A Tribe Called Quest growing up.

also it ignores whether or not the song is enjoyable to listen to as music (it isn't)