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Rachel Moore
25512
Debra Moore
May 2, 2013
Misogyny Impacts Culture
Starting in the South Bronx in the late 1970s (early 80s) rap music has gone through
multiple phases. From love, fear, anger, pride, misogyny, and even violence, the medium of rap
has been used to express these ideas, feelings, and emotions (Adams and Fuller 939). However,
artists like 2 Live Crew and N.W.A. brought the misogynistic lyrics more into the listeners reach.
2 Live Crew wrote songs that can be arguably entertaining, but still put women in the negative
light that they are just sex objects to men. N.W.A. has misogynistic, as well as violent lyrics too.
Both groups, however, made their songs direct, leaving the pop culture innuendos behind; thus
making room for artists like Snoop Lion (formally known as Snoop Dogg), Lil Wayne, and
Drake to write music that continues to objectify women. Even though some people will argue
that it’s only freedom of expression and creativity, rap music promotes the hatred of women in
its listeners by the misogynistic lyrics and the way women are represented in music videos.
Furthermore, exposure to rap music at a young age sculpts the mind to perceive women more as
objects than actual human beings.
Rap artists who objectify women in their music only do it from a creative standpoint;
people nonetheless find it a reflection of the unconscious acceptance of negative categorizations
of women (Adams and Fuller 943). It is true that rap music itself has a love for women, but when
talking about women and love while using misogynistic lyrics contradicts itself. Describing a
woman’s body and sexual relations is not what someone should think “love” is all about. It is
misogyny.
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People know what they are listening to and know it is demeaning towards women but
society still accepts it. Restrictions, however, have been placed on songs that are played on the
radio. Billboard now editorializes songs before they can be played on air (Armstrong182).
Censoring and having clean versions of songs help listeners a little bit, even though it still has the
same meaning.
However, the explicit versions of songs are the way the artist intended them to be heard.
Buying CDs, searching on YouTube, and even downloading off of iTunes, allows listeners to be
able to access these original, or explicit, versions. Artists will argue that saying “bitches and
hoes” is just an expression of creativity, and that they have the freedom of speech, so nothing
negative should come from it. According to Adams and Fuller, the usage of misogynistic lyrics
allows the male artists to boost themselves while degrading women (948). Listeners who idolize
these artists won’t know the difference; therefore, perceive women to be “bitches and hoes,”
especially when hearing the lyrical content at a young age. This mindlessness leads to the
problem of promoting hatred towards women.
While rap music is created with the intention of showing expression, the lyrical content in
rap promotes a misogynistic ideology to its listeners. As mentioned, there is no indirectness with
rap artists’ lyrics these days. They can go as far as rapper 2 Chainz’s “Birthday” lyric “all I want
for my birthday is a big booty hoe” to Lil Wayne’s “I lost a few good bitches, met some more
bad bitches, and I be schoolin' them niggas,” in “Love Me.” Experts say media directly gives the
public acceptance over the negative attitudes towards women (Johnson, Jackson, and Gatto 31).
Similarly, when an artist writes music they unconsciously are influenced by the negative views
of women that they give them. If a girl is wearing short shorts and a cute blouse that shows a
little skin, she is automatically thought to be a “hoochie mama,” or have no class.
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Rap artists describe women as “bitches and hoes” or, even worse, just describe them by
one of their body parts. Sir Mix-A-Lot’s 1992 smash hit “Baby Got Back” is a prime example of
this body selecting:
I want 'em real thick and juicy
So find that juicy double
Mix-a-Lot's in trouble
Beggin' for a piece of that bubble
So I'm lookin' at rock videos
Knock-kneeded bimbos walkin' like hoes…
Although this research is directed towards rap music, other genres of music display
misogyny too. Country music objectifies women, maybe not as blunt. Women are perceived as
sex objects and to just have a good time in their cowboy boots. They can also be perceived as the
complete opposite and be the cheater in the relationship who sold the guy’s truck, money, and
slept with his best friend (Adams and Fuller 945). Rock music isn’t any better. Rockstars have
their fair share of telling about their sexual relations with obsessed groupies. Needless to say,
misogynistic views have a home in the music industry.
Misogyny is not just in the form of song lyrics either, but in the music videos too.
Although there can be more than one, there is almost always one female in a music video with a
male rapper. She’s what is called the “music-video vixen” (Moor 2). The vixen is used to attract
more viewers. Women are served as eye candy and made to make the male figure look more
irresistible by hanging and dancing around him. Normally, they tend to be in a rather sexy outfit,
or half-naked. A viewer now will have a mental image in their head of how the song is supposed
to make someone feel or do. Music videos leave the viewer open to having derogatory thoughts
about the women they see dancing inappropriately on someone they idolize.
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Photograph, Lean by Ayanah Moor, displays the “music-video vixen” dancing in the
circle with hardly a shirt on next to a few other girls and guys in the video.
Figure 1 Ayanah Moor, Lean, 2006, Digital Print, 18" x 24"
Furthermore, rap music (along with other genres) has influenced its listeners to perceive
women differently. Young men have had their minds sculpted to perceive women more as
objects than actual human beings. Women, especially young women, have it in their minds that
they have to be and act a certain way to get attention from the opposite sex. Women want to have
both beauty and brains, not be thought of just a piece of meat.
From the music, women also brought views of how women look and judge each other.
Women rappers have to fight harder than male rappers to be taken more seriously (Moody 190).
Female rappers, such as Mary J. Bilge, write music to empower women, to be independent, and
to bring women into more of a positive outlook. There are still some misogynistic lyrics present,
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but if these songs empower women and keep putting them in positive light, rap music will be
able to change again.
Moody’s article “The Meaning Of ‘Independent Woman’ In Music” explains that people
have different views of what they consider “being independent.” Moody presents her argument
by stating that independence should be in lyrics, but not combined with ideas about materialism,
unrealistic standards, and beauty (188). She uses her daughter as an example when explaining
that songs that include these meanings should not be modeled after, especially for young girls
(194). Everyone should have their own opinion and idea of what an “independent woman” is and
not set their standards towards someone else’s idea to fit in.
By objectifying women into categories and demeaning them by the way they look, or
don’t look, has roughly affected today’s culture. Researchers Adams and Fuller describe that
music can be a numerous and questionably powerful form of art with the potential to influence
and support the structural system and cultural ideologies (940).
To prove that there is a negative acceptance of viewing women based on listening to and
watching rap music, a study was given to show that violent music videos and sexual imagery
affect young males, particularly African Americans. The study called for 46 black low-income
males to participate in the method of researching this investigation. Three controls were viewed;
one was showing the boys’ violent videos, then non-violent videos, and lastly no music videos,
but two vignettes to read (Johnson, Jackson, and Gatto 30). Based on the results, young men who
watched the violent videos had a more negative response towards women than those who were in
the other two controlled groups.
In another study, young women exposed to more rap music are shown to be more likely
to engage in risky and unhealthy behaviors. 522 low socioeconomic college female students
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participated in this study (Iwamoto, Creswell, and Caldwell 342). Their results conclude that
even educated youth are influenced by this particular genre of music too and that it isn’t a racial
issue anymore; both black and white have influenced perspectives.
Everyone is guilty of listening to and singing along with a popular rap song at some point
in time. They are aware of what was being said and have the right to perceive it as creativity, or
the lack of creativity. Through the usage of misogynistic lyrics and derogatory music videos
though, the listeners of rap music are influenced to perceive women in negative aspects. Culture,
especially in the United States, is shaped based on the mainstream of media. Trends come and
go, but with progression of expanding music into a modern approach, the lyrics change the
listeners’ attitudes. Getting basic knowledge of how adolescents relate to rap music is a start,
while learning how to cope with it is the on-going challenge.
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Works Cited
Adams, Terri M., and Douglas B. Fuller. "The Words Have Changed But The Ideology Remains
The Same: Misogynistic Lyrics In Rap Music." Journal Of Black Studies 36.6 (2006):
938-957. Academic Search Premier. Web. 6 Apr. 2013.
Armstrong, Edward G. "Devil Music And Gangsta Rap: A Comparison Of Sexual Violence In
Blues And Rap Lyrics." Arkansas Review: A Journal Of Delta Studies 33.3 (2002): 182.
Academic Search Premier. Web. 8 Apr. 2013.
Iwamoto, Derek K., John Creswell, and Leon Caldwell. "Feeling The Beat: The Meaning Of Rap
Music For Ethnically Diverse Midwestern College Students—A Phenomenological
Study." Adolescence 42.166 (2007): 337-351. Academic Search Premier. Web. 8 Apr.
2013.
Johnson, James D., Lee Anderson Jackson, and Leslie Gatto. "Violent Attitudes And Deferred
Academic Aspirations: Deleterious Effects Of Exposure To Rap Music." Basic &
Applied Social Psychology 16.1/2 (1995): 27-41. Academic Search Premier. Web. 7 Apr.
2013.
Moody, Mia. "The Meaning Of ‘Independent Woman’ In Music." ETC: A Review Of General
Semantics 68.2 (2011): 187-198. Academic Search Premier. Web. 7 Apr. 2013.
Moor, Ayanah. “Lean.” 2006. Photograph.
Moor, Ayanah. "Still." Meridians: Feminism, Race, Transnationalism 8.1 (2008): 205-210.
Academic Search Premier. Web. 7 Apr. 2013.