Songs where the singer/protagonist comes off as a serious dick without meaning to

Sounds like he’s good at fucking

Yeah, I think that's part of the implication (not sure why we're being asked to cheer that, though; seems like a private matter).

let's hear it for the dong

songs where the protagonist has a serious dick

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJncHEZ3URs

“Banks of Sweet Primroses” qualifies, at least in the versions I know, but is also totally baffling. Narrator hits on a beautiful lady who appears to be weeping, promises that he’ll fix everything if she will grant him “one small relief.” Then she reveals that the narrator, who apparently didn’t recognize her, is in fact the cause of her weeping, and plans to go off to some lonesome valley. Final verse:

So come all young men who go a-sailing
Pray pay attention to what I say
For there's many a dark and a cloudy morning
Turns out to be a sunshiny day

I always thought "No Scrubs" was mean

dylan's don't think twice is a piece of self-justifying, smug, passive-aggressive, deep cuntography.

if dylan meant to be a dick with don't think twice, it's only because he knows no other mode of being.

to wit:

I once loved a woman, a child, I'm told
I gave her my heart but she wanted my soul

Goodbye's too good a word, babe
So I'll just say, "Fare thee well"
I ain't a-saying you treated me unkind
You could've done better but I don't mind
You just kinda wasted my precious time

"Don't Think Twice It's Alright" is one where I really have a hard time sympathizing with the speaker -- he sounds like such a mean and bitter person beneath all the maudlin self-pity.

― five six and (man alive), Thursday, August 27, 2015 9:10 AM (seven years ago)

I think Dylan totally means to be a dick though

― Ma$e-en-scène (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Thursday, August 27, 2015 9:17 AM (seven years ago)

(It may be true that Dylan "knows no other way of being," but that fact doesn't necessarily shoehorn a "purposefully dickish" song into qualifying for this thread...?)

my contention here is that dylan cannot be purposely dickish because he has no idea what being not-a-dick would mean.

I always thought "No Scrubs" was mean

― frogbs, Wednesday, June 28, 2023 12:28 AM (seven hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

Agreed. Total classist bullshit. As a poor guy in 1999, it really stung.

When I first read about the Vardy's on fire chants as shared above, I briefly thought they were to the tune of Eno's "Baby's on Fire" and this then stuck in my brane for weeks, and still comes back when I see his gurning fizzog, or indeed his wife.

"Semi-Charmed Life"

Jamie Vardy of Leicester
Looked at the samples that we sent
And furrowed his brow

I always thought "No Scrubs" was mean

― frogbs, Wednesday, June 28, 2023 12:28 AM (seven hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

Agreed. Total classist bullshit. As a poor guy in 1999, it really stung.

― peace, man, Wednesday, June 28, 2023 7:03 AM (seven hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

this can't be real

I took the song at knocking aggressive guys down a peg, overconfident dudes who want to do nothing but big-up themselves and talk about how badass they are, aggressively catcall/harass women *while they're driving*, and are completely full of shit.

I remember a friend of mine being really offended by this song back in 1999.

like yeah she knocks dudes who live at home or don't have a car but she also calls out dudes who have shorties and don't love them, people who scream at women out the sides of cars, people who talk about all the things they 'want' (or things they're gonna do) but never actually do it or have any intent to do it.

yeah, exactly. if you've ever met a scrub, you know. she's not saying "fuck poor dudes"

she's talking about self-awareness more than anything

If you don't have a car and you're walking
Oh yes son, I'm talking to you

like yeah she knocks dudes who live at home or don't have a car

she is very specifically knocking poor people there

sure if you want to ignore the context that fits into and frame the song as a JP Morgan-nose thumbing, sure. and that it's directed at cocky men who pursue her and harass her aggressively and talk a big game about how big they're going to make it, but don't actually do anything but sit at home and play video games instead of looking for a job or blowing all their money on needless shit instead of saving it to get things like...a car.

If you live at home with your momma
Oh yes son, (I'm) I'm talking to you (baby)

babies can't live alone dummy

itt - ppl who know what scrubs are and ppl who don't

lol Evan

ppl who know what scrubs are and ppl who don't

Hence the song title, "Know Scrubs"

lol

"Oh Boy, Scrubs (That's Where I'm a Viking!)"

I hope those no scrubs girls eventually found some classy guys cruising up Peachtree St in Atlanta

Not to be all enlightened centrist here but I think the song can be a basically right on paen to telling overconfident sexist dudes to fuck off while still mirroring some of the poverty-as-a-moral-failing shit that was basically everywhere in the pop culture of the time.

I try to like black music, but I just can't get over how it doesn't conform to my white middle class sensibilities!

Rise up, 99%, against this classist tyranny

posts where the poster/protagonist comes off as a serious dick without meaning to

no i definitely meant to :)

I totally agree with you, fwiw

I think the white middle class is also anti-Scrub

They also dislike poors

They’re only mean Trotskyists and revisionists

They

peace man, I honestly don’t think Chilli was talking about dudes like you, you don’t seem like a scrub

One can read "no scrubs" as punching up. Like, you think you are hot shit and you have a lot to offer, but you live in your mom's basement and you need your friend to drive you places because you are actually broke and going nowhere.

One can also read "No Scrubs" as a blanket dismissal of dudes who have aspirations, but have a ways to go.

Even in this slightly more charitable reading, the dude in question still needs to up his game before he approaches someone of TLC caliber. It's not just money; it's independence and competence.

So Scrubs is like the opposite of Let’s Hear for The Boy

So Scrubs is like the opposite of Let’s Hear for The Boy

Maybe! I would rather be with the guy described in "Let's Hear it for the Boy" than the guy described in "No Scrubs."