TLOP review.
Misogyny plagues Black American culture, both subtly and blatantly, in obvious ways and pervasive ways. It helps to uphold patriarchal hierarchy, maintains strict gender roles, and fantastically distorts black sexuality. In other words, misogyny works to preserve and legitimize sexism. Moreover, as Angela Davis stresses in her analysis of the relationships between systems of oppression, oppressive power structures support one another. So racism and classism support sexism, and when moving against one of these systems, one must also reject the other systems that operate almost in unison, or the movement will fail. So it's somewhat illogical and indeed counterproductive to chant "we shall overcome" while exhibiting or perpetuating misogyny. The origins of misogyny in Black America deserve careful consideration. However, regardless of how misogyny began to operate within our culture, the fact remains that it operates as a subversive and destructive force, and we bear the responsibility of investigating its toxic effects and working to eradicate it. Since art often reflects culture, artistic expressions often mirror or reveal cultural attitudes. Critics of rap music (some anti-black and some pro-black) and rappers themselves have long noted the problematic treatment of women within the genre, thus noting the phenomenon of misogyny in the black community. Even so, rappers continue to degrade women, and few listeners really hold them accountable. Ironically, even the "conscious" or "aware" or "woke" rap artists participate in this denigration of femininity. For instance, the critically acclaimed artist, Tupac Shakur created a song entitled “Keep Ya Head Up” in which he analyzed the misogyny within the black community, rapping: “I wonder why we take from our women/why we rape our women/do we hate our women”. However, on the very same album, on the song “I Get Around”, Shakur speaks of “keeping... hoes in check”. Other rappers also create seemingly contradictory records. The contradiction is obvious, but another question perhaps deserves more of our attention: Does the music reveal how oppressive language works to subvert the language of progress, especially when the words come from the same mouth, and moreover, does this point to the connection between systems of oppression that Davis emphasizes? I say, absolutely yes, and the latest album by Kanye West, entitled The Life of Pablo, supports the notion that oppressive institutions work together to undermine social progress.
West’s work provides an excellent medium through which to explore this idea because he works as both a vocalist and a producer; he utters language and also composes musical arrangements in order to convey a(n) (in)coherent message. So we do well to immediately note the Christian overtones in The Life of Pablo. The first song, “Ultralight Beam” begins with a young girl who seems to possess the euphoric holy ghost. She shouts loudly “we don’t want no devils in the house, God. We want the Lord… Halleluiah”. As the song moves forward, it sounds more and more like a gospel song. A guest singer almost wails about trying to keep faith. An actual gospel choir supports him, soulfully accenting the “faith”. West then declares the divinity of the moment, saying: “This is a God dream”. As West prays for serenity and peace in a slightly auto- tuned, Southside Chicago dialect, a mellow organ speaks to a base line that mimics West’s accent. A light heavyweight drum break makes an occasional statement. Then the choir joins West in his refrain. They sound like gospel choirs sound, like the solar system: far way, yet very close, ethereal, yet visceral. A notable gospel singer then takes a solo, singing about struggles, oppression, and hope. She “looks to the light… [knowing that the divinity] will make everything alright… [and] take good care of [her]”. After her solo, a guest rapper takes the main microphone, making all kinds of references to Judeo-Christianity, including treating demons like Martin treated Pam (ostracizing them), letting his little light shine, giving glory to the divinity, and referencing the Great Flood, the biblical origin of the rainbow, and the infamous pillar of salt that Lot’s wife turned into during the Jewish god’s destruction of the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. So immediately, the album creates a religious tone both lyrically and musically.
Such an introduction becomes more interesting when we think about gospel music and Christianity’s strange relationship to sexuality and patriarchy. Some Christian imagery contains clear sexual overtones. The divinity possesses some kind of ownership over the follower’s material body; the divinity ravages the follower’s body, drawing upon and reinforcing a rigid system of power dynamics (see John Donne). This power arrangement also establishes normal and abnormal uses of the body. So gospel songs that contain lyrics like “No one can do you like Jesus” or “You’re the only power that can save this world today” point to an all powerful father-god who determines correct and incorrect usages of one’s body, a determination that of course extends to one’s sexuality and privileges gender and specific expressions of sexuality. Or consider the practice of praise dancing in Black Christianity. It has similarities to popular, secular dances that have sexual overtones. The praise dancer’s body comes under the control of God, and even movements that seem explicitly sexual cause no issues because the performer does them within the context of the boundaries of religion. So a clear relationship exists between religious order and sexuality. This relationship becomes even more complicated when we think of the circumstances in which black people took up Christianity (i.e. colonialism and slavery). For a black person trapped within the institution of slavery, unable to assert bodily control, a subversion of Christianity and its constructions of sexuality could provide an avenue to even a small degree of bodily control. One could exercise a sort of freedom to give his/her body to God, rejecting the white slaver’s legal assertion of ownership.
TLOP contains plenty of examples of West attempting to assert a bodily control (which our anti-black society denies black people the right to do) through sexuality. Whether intentional or not, West’s use of gospel samples and choirs point to this effort, since Christianity and sexuality relate to one another. Moreover, some of West’s lyrics indeed reveal a pro-black stance, a desire for unhibited black subjectivity. On the song “Father Stretch My Hands Pt. 1”, he moans: “I just wanna feel liberated”. In other songs, he expresses a similar desire: “As far as my business/I’m the only one that’s in control” or even the seemingly narcissistic “I love you like Kanye loves Kanye”. We may debate about arrogance and self inflation, but we must not overlook that such lyrics point to self assertion, and even if this self assertion proves confused and imbalanced, it reveals a desire to reject the denial of black subjectivity, a pretty important task to attempt. Moreover, in the song “Wolves”, West does exactly what black slaves did when forced to convert to Christianity: He subverts it in order to explore his own selfhood. He raps: “What if Mary/ was in the club/’fore she met Joseph/around hella’ thugs”. Here, West subverts the nativity story in order to reflect upon the consequences of his sexual expression. The song explores whether or not sexual expression proves an effective way to reclaim one’s body (or to exercise a little more control over one’s body). West seems quite self-aware in “Wolves”, wondering about what his late mother would think of his path to self-assertion. He sings in a scratchy voice: “If mama knew now/how you turned out/you too wild”. The baseline in this song moans sorrowfully, and a vocal sample woos listeners into a contemplative mind state.
However, this awareness does little to address the major flaw in West’s path to self assertion through sexual expression: He allows misogynistic attitudes to infiltrate his movement. Now, sexual expression does not equate with misogyny. However, the difference becomes hazy throughout the album. For instance, when West speaks about participating in public sex that develops into a mass orgy in “Freestyle 4” (which features eerie strings, abrasive synth sounds, and slightly industrial drums) or proposes shooting pornographic videos with a portable go pro on his genitals, we could view such lyrics as distasteful to say the least. If we hold the view that sex inherently reinforces problematic gender roles, then perhaps these lyrics have patriarchal overtones, but they don’t explicitly degrade women. Moreover, if we deem such lyrics as problematic, we could insinuate that black male sexuality is somehow problematic, which is not the case. However, some expressions of sexuality can indeed have problematic consequences, and West seems to ignore them. Throughout, the album he degrades women in order to assert his sexual expression. This occurs early on in TLOP. In “Father Stretch my Hands” he utters a very disturbing line about sex with a model: “Now if I fuck this model/and she just bleached her asshole/and I get bleach on my t-shirt/I’m gon’ feel like an asshole”. Here, he clearly denigrates his female sexual partner, reducing her subjectivity to a mere body part. He has no concern for her liberation or self assertion. By subscribing to such misogynistic views, West denies another marginalized group the opportunity for liberation. He contributes to patriarchy. The primary danger in the support he gives to the oppressive system of patriarchy involves the dehumanization of women. The secondary danger involves the underpinning of West’s own desire for liberation, for systems of patriarchy and racism function along with each other.
West commits this error all throughout TLOP. On the song “Famous”, he claims that his sexuality significantly affects the autonomy and life experience of others (exclusively women). Ironically, West includes a Nina Simone sample in this song, a singer who personally experienced and fought against misogyny. On “Feedback” he literally offers women as commodities, labeling himself the “ghetto Oprah”. On the same song he speaks on police brutality and black mental health. Confusing. He completely fails to address the relationship between black oppression and women’s oppression. The ultimate example of this failure comes in the song “Highlights”, in which West calls for black men to impregnate white women so that these women will bear black children. He uses the metaphor of the “fruit of Islam in the trenches” to justify his interracial sexual desire, but he actually dehumanizes women by both his problematic advice and strange perversion of religion (this time Islam as opposed to Christianity). Sometimes he doesn’t make this mistake explicitly, but his misunderstandings of the links between oppressive systems surface almost subtly. For instance, in the expertly produced “30 Hours” (the drums knock, the baseline soothes, and the sample warms) West condemns a former girlfriend for sexual promiscuity, the very tool through which he seeks to assert himself! On “No More Parties in L.A”, West reveals his subscription to patriarchy with the line: “I be worried my daughter/ I worried about Kim [his wife]/ but Saint [his son] is baby ‘Ye, I ain’t ‘bout him”. So both inadvertently and intentionally, West perpetuates gender inequality and supports patriarchal power structures.
Regardless if West is aware of his error, it surfaces enough to subvert or even negate his positive themes. As mentioned, he touches on police brutality and black mental health. In part two of “Father Stretch My Hands” and in the song “Real Friends” he touches on black familial relationships. He does well to address these topics, but his conclusions aren’t fully fleshed out; they contain plenty of contradictions; and point to a confusion of how power functions. In a way, TLOP makes the same mistakes that gospel music makes: It seeks to treat certain institutions of oppression while failing to reject, and thus bolstering others. For Angela Davis, this error can render movements useless. She explores how early feminist movements fell victim to racism and classism and thus proved less effective. Perhaps we should recommend Davis’ work to West: #readinglistforkanye maybe? Despite its major flaw, the album has plenty of great moments, and West conveys the same complicated feelings that listeners may experience when they listen (critically) to religious music. On a linguistic level, West not only contradicts himself, but presents a rather unclear message; he constantly subverts himself. TLOP clearly reveals how oppressive systems intermingle and how one can’t quite fight one in particular if he/she supports another. Moreover, West, through his stylistic choices (not only lyrical but also compositional) alludes to the complex relationship between sexuality and Christianity. In a way, West really is “driving in the same car that they killed Pac [Shakur] in”, meaning that like Tupac, and like numerous artists and people, West has a great deal of complications and inconsistencies that surface in his art. There are no justifications for West’s misogyny. Nothing will happen if he does or does not hold himself accountable for it. But if we as listeners hold him accountable, we teach and learn that such attitudes only work to obstruct liberation.
Grade: B-
Favorite track: “Ultralight Beam”
