FEATURE:
Get Your Sh!t Together…
IN THIS PHOTO: Actor Issa Rae’s series, Rap Sh!t, both celebrates and highlights the razor-sharp wit and warmth of Black women in Hip-Hop, in addition to showing how they are debased and consumes them/PHOTO CREDIT: Cass Bird for ELLE
Issa Rae’s Power Critique of the Music Industry and the Way It Debases Black Women
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I recently wrote a feature …
IMAGE CREDIT: Max
around rapper Megan Thee Stallion and how there was a lot of misogynoir around her when she said she was shot by Tory Lanez (who is serving a ten-year sentence for shooting her). The fact that many thought she was lying. This sort of questioning of credibility is something that a lot of women face daily. It is rife in the music industry. Being belittled, gaslight and abused. Black female artists face it more than anyone else. There seems to be this discrimination and unflinching misogynoir that has been present through Rap and Hip-Hop for a while now. It seems that there is no rest for Megan Thee Stallion. Someone who is always being called out and discredited. She is not the only example of a Black woman in Rap getting this sort of treatment. In a music scene that treats Black female rappers often as side characters, the confident and incredible powerhouses like Megan Thee Stallion and Trina are influential and empowering women around the world. I will come to some research and words I might have already used for that Megan Thee Stallion feature. This may not seem like the most festive feature – as it is Christmas Eve! -, though it is important to tackle misogyny and misogyny through the music industry. It is my thoughts again as actor Issa Rae (who recently appeared in Barbie) highlights the insidious nature of the music business. The way Black women, especially throughout Rap, are debased dehumanised, disbelieved and demeaned. Rap Sh!t shines a spotlight (or blacklight, given the grubbiness on display) on an industry that needs to clean itself up and tackle its discrimination and disrespect against Black women. From the start, it is important to point out that is a drama/comedy and not a documentary. It features fictional rappers and their story (though I think there is a touch of City Girls to them), though it is an accurate and relatable portrayal of what Black women in Hip-Hop face. Written by and starring Aida Osman, there are episodes directed by Amy Aniobi and Ava Berkofsky (and starring RJ Cyler).
I usually quote chunks from articles. On this occasion, as The Guardian’s feature about Rap Sh!t has so much important detail, I will leave it unedited. It is alarming learning what Black woman through Hip-Hop have to endure. How they are perceived. A lack of respect. Maybe the scene is not as bad as it was years ago. It is clear there is still a very long way to go:
“Actor and writer Issa Rae once called the music business “probably the worst industry I’ve ever come across”. In a 2021 interview with the Los Angeles Times, Rae criticized the business as “abusive”, full of “crooks and criminals”.
“I thought Hollywood was crazy. The music industry, it needs to start over,” Rae said.
Rap Sh!t, Rae’s latest series since her critically acclaimed Insecure, acts as a fable on the music business’s insidious nature. The dramedy, following two emerging Black female rappers, is a razor-sharp and hilarious study on how Black women navigate the industry and the cost of carving out space for one’s self. Now in its second season, Rap Sh!t provides a stinging critique of how the music industry consumes and debases Black women, while also offering a hilarious and heartfelt story of two underdogs pursuing their dreams.
The show follows two up-and-coming female rappers from Miami, navigating the underbelly of the music industry while figuring out early adulthood. Shawna (Aida Osman) is a hotel receptionist, trying to build a legitimate rap career. She is frustrated on multiple fronts: the stagnation of her artist following and the pressure she faces to use her sexuality to inspire attention.
While talented, clips of her delivering socially conscious raps in a mask only garner pithy likes. “I want people to focus on the lyricism,” Shawna quips, when asked why she hides her face.
Mia (KaMillion) is a single mother working three jobs, including a popularish OnlyFans. Compared to Shawna’s sanctimoniousness, Mia embraces her sexuality and the pleasure that comes with it. But she struggles with her own feelings of being adrift, especially in the face of balancing parenthood and her aspirations. When the two reconnect on a night out, they write the ever-catchy song Seduce and Scheme. Once it goes viral, Shawna and Mia embark on a tour with tour manager and sex work manager Chastity (Jonica Booth).
Rap Sh!t emerges as Black female rappers continue to dominate the airwaves, from Miami duo City Girls to Megan Thee Stallion. Their music is empowering and fun, with lyrics that embrace the freedom of being sexual, feminine and dominant as the world tries to dictate otherwise.
Spliced with videos from Instagram and Tik Tok, season one focused on the currency of clout as a tool (and detriment) for emerging artists to be seen. But season two sinks into an even darker terrain. Having now achieved the “dream” of a tour, Shawna and Mia are met with the rotten core of the music space.
The writers of Rap Sh!t confidently touch upon a kaleidoscope of issues, including clout, cultural appropriation and misogyny within rap. Reina (Kat Cunning), a white rapper, gains more notoriety than Shawna and Mia, despite having less talent. She is able to cosplay as Black, hairstyle and all, a wink to known racial chameleons like Iggy Azalea.
Music producer Francois (Jaboukie Young-White), who invited both women on the tour, treats them as pawns, grabbing on their coattails to ride their wave of success while passing them off as soon as another opportunity emerges.
The show also continues Rae’s legacy of delivering hilarious, realistic portrayals of Black women. For five seasons, Rae starred in Insecure, which followed the daily lives and romantic relationships of Issa (played by Rae) and her best friend Molly (Yvonne Orji). The show was rightfully described as groundbreaking for its rejection of cliche and its attention to the everyday disappointments that mark real life.
Rap Sh!t also includes Rae’s attention and reverence of Black female friendship. Shawna and Mia are frequently each other’s last defense against the toxic treatment of the music industry, especially in the face of abusive men. Between stops on tour, they share details of their sexual and romantic relationships, sleepover-style.
But the show also includes grittier topics of poverty, abuse, and mental health. Shawna, Mia and Chastity all struggle to make ends meet while embarking on what is supposed to be a life-changing tour. Even those who have “made it” are notably miserable as their turn with fame and success proves to be poisonous.
Rap Sh!t feels ever more relevant amid the real life degradation of Black female talent, including the assault of Megan Thee Stallion and the subsequent mistreatment of her. It acts as a mirror and interrogation of these events, an engaging and funny depiction of how the music industry really “works”.
We live in a time when I think a lot of women in Pop are less sexualised and expressive than before through fear of abuse and misogyny. Being judged, shamed or criticised for being explicit or simply confident. This is definitely happening in Hip-Hop! Affecting incredible Black female rappers who are using their music to feel liberated and celebrate their bodies. Linking to Rap Sh!t and the misogynoir in the industry, I can bring in this feature from earlier in the year. Alongside this wave of Rap queens defiantly embraced their sexuality comes those who turn it against them:
“Women in rap have been making music about their bodies and sexual endeavors since its inception. In a new era of sexual liberation and body positivity, contemporary female rappers ranging from Megan Thee Stallion and Latto to Sexyy Red and Sukihana are channeling the fearless candidness of their predecessors, unapologetically expressing their sexuality and desires on tracks that have also become some of rap’s biggest hits in recent years. Despite this, it’s been unfortunate and frustrating to see some people use these artists’ hypersexualized personas against them, particularly in excusing abuse and unwanted sexual advances from men.
This problem came to a head this week, when videos surfaced of YK Osiris forcing himself on Sukihana for a kiss at the Crew League basketball tournament in Atlanta. In clips shared online, it’s clear that she’s shocked by his advances and is trying to dodge them, but no one helps her. Amid these clips going viral, a video from a three-month-old episode of Kandi Burruss’ Kandi Koated podcast surfaced, with the clip showing Burruss’ co-host A1 making aggressive sexual advances toward Sukihana.
Although visibly uncomfortable in the interview, Sukihana tries her best to navigate it, laughing off A1’s advances and even telling him he’s being aggressive. Still, the co-host doesn’t get the hint, instead continuing his advances and arguing that Sukihana liked them, with no one coming to the rapper’s defense.
In 2022, Latto shared how she dealt with sexual harassment leading up to the release of her debut album, 777. During an appearance on Big Boy’s Neighborhood, the rapper alleged that one of the people featured on her album initially wouldn’t clear the song because she wouldn’t respond to his advances.
“It’s a feature on my album that was difficult to clear. They’re trying to drop their nuts on me because I won’t respond to a DM,” she said. “We think like, ‘Oh, well that just comes with the game being a female rapper.’ No it shouldn’t, though. You know you ain’t doing that to your fellow male rappers!”
Although she never revealed who harassed her, many speculated that it was Kodak Black who she was referring to (he appears on the track “Bussdown”), who denied it was him on social media. Shortly after this, Latto suggested that she regretted bringing up the matter during an appearance on The Breakfast Club, saying: “You hear, like, ‘Oh, female rappers have it harder.’ But I really wanted to give a little insight as to what specifically makes it harder for a female rapper. I didn’t want it to distract from the music or anything, so I kind of wish, in a way, I didn’t say that.”
But women in this industry and beyond shouldn’t have to be afraid or regret speaking a necessary truth, and calling out wrongs done to them. It’s clear that there’s still a double standard when it comes to women rappers who are autonomous in their sexual expression, with their hypersexualized personas seen as a justification for the abuse they face. But, as Sukihana succinctly put in an Instagram post following the incident with YK: “I am human, a woman, a mother and daughter before I am an entertainer. No matter what my lyrics express, I still have boundaries and a right to have them”.
I am going to wrap up soon. Tying this to the theme of misogynoir and abuse Black female Hip-Hop artists face – and the fact the industry is not really acting on it -, it is worth coming back to Megan Thee Stallion. A case of a high-profile artist who faces so much scrutiny and doubt regarding her version of events and story during the Tony Lanez trial. A stereotype of Black women pervades. That they are promiscuous, deceitful and teasers. It is worth reading this Vox article from August. The pain and critique that Megan Thee Stallion faced and suffered. How the trail is over – her pain is very far from over. The music industry have to answer a lot of questions and make efforts to implement #MeToo and a campaign against abuse and misogyny aimed at Black women:
“Megan is also being scrutinized. Whether it’s the pause she took before she answered Gayle King’s question about whether she was intimate with Tory Lanez or people questioning why she was on the cover of Forbes or why she wrote an op-ed in the New York Times or why she went out partying “too soon” after she was shot, her every move in the past two years seems to be watched and policed. Can you talk about the level of scrutiny she’s been receiving since she made the allegations?
The criticism she received for pausing after Gayle asked her that question is an extended metaphor. Why can’t she have a pause? Can she have a moment? Everything she’s doing at this moment is being examined. She’s not the one on trial. She’s not the one that’s being brought before the criminal legal system. He is. And yet, every single movement, blink, gesture, or decision that she is making is under this very powerful microscope has the ability to reshape the narrative.
The pause in that moment, I think she might have just been caught off guard by the question. And having to disclose your sexual life — it really is no one’s business. Because even if she were intimately involved with Tory, even if she had said yes, there’s nothing that changes about what that violation is. And had she said yes, that would have been a confirmation for folks of all of these other narratives that she’s jealous and lying. The conundrum that a lot of Black women victims and survivors of intimate violence face is that, no matter the outcome, they will forever be under this microscope. And not only that, folks will make jokes, and malign and vilify these women to make these women the ones who are accountable for harm, and not the person who harmed them.
I’d like to talk a little more about the stereotypes about Black women that we’ve seen emerge in this case that are being put onto Megan. We’ve already talked about some of them, like Black women as hypersexual jezebels. And then there’s also the idea that she is aggressive and angry, aided by her “Black” facial features and skin complexion. I’ve seen people argue that Megan had to have done something to provoke Tory, whether that was to hit him or berate him. Megan has even had to come out and say she didn’t first assault Tory that night. How has this stereotype factored into how this case is being treated?
The stereotypes abound in this case. It’s a terrible storm of these racialized gender stereotypes of Black women. It’s about her size, Blackness, and womanhood that are being put on display here and being used to say that she is the aggressor. We heard that with Chris Brown and Rihanna — that because she’s a West Indian woman, she had to have been beating on him first. With Megan, we’ve heard the “she’s so big and he’s so small” narrative that plays into this physicality argument that’s being made about her. Even with her saying this is what happened that evening, people latch onto these problematic narratives that are rooted in stereotypes that Black women are loud, angry, and they put their hands on you. People have claimed that Tory was just defending himself. These stereotypes about Black women endure, and there’s no grace or compassion.
And there’s no sense that Tory could be lying. We don’t even have a framing or a term for how we think about distrust of men in the way that we do for women. There is this framing of women as irrational and emotional, which is viewed as a negative. At the same time, it’s impossible for the general public to imagine Tory having an emotional response that night and acting out of that emotional response. His emotionality isn’t put on trial. No one is really asking, why do you think the gun even came out? Or what does it mean for him to be in that space? What is the emotional geography of what happened in that car?
IN THIS PHOTO: Megan Thee Stallion/PHOTO CREDIT: Getty Images
And in thinking about Tory’s emotional response in that way, it seems like the public also doesn’t have the range to fathom that such violence could have actually happened to Megan. It seems that people can’t process or aren’t even trying to process the allegation that someone could have just pulled a gun out and shot at another person’s feet, saying “Dance, bitch!” according to an LAPD detective. This, despite the many examples of this kind of violence taking place against Black women and despite Megan showing photos of her foot with bullet fragments, among other evidence that’s so far available to the public. What do you make of that?
When I talk to people about the data around the prevalence and pervasiveness of violence against Black women, their jaws drop because they don’t really conceive of it as an everyday occurrence. But it’s something that’s a part of so many Black women’s experiences that it becomes very easy to dismiss this case as spectacular. And so they treat it as something to choose a side on. That’s a misguided approach because the side that we all need to be on is ending interpersonal and intimate violence. We don’t want anyone harmed. And there are more layers to this; not only are some people saying Tory wasn’t the one to harm Megan, but they are also saying she just wasn’t harmed at all.
The broad consideration here is that 40 percent of Black women at some point in their lifetime will experience some form of physical violence, quite often in an intimate or interpersonal context. That is a significant number. Megan has now become part of a club no one wants to belong to — the club of millions of Black women historically and contemporarily who have faced non-fatal assaults, and in some cases fatal assaults. I think getting people to understand the gravity of this problem, the reality of interpersonal violence, and its frequency is an important part of this work.
This case comes at an interesting time in our country, in which Me Too backlash is real. What final thoughts can you share with us about where we are as a culture when it comes to violence against women and violence against Black women? And what might this case’s outcome mean for discourse going forward?
It’s important to note that these are artists of a particular generation, so everything is online. Megan came forward with what happened to her on Instagram Live. That is a marker of the times. This is also happening post-Me Too, so of course there is backlash and the idea that we have gone too far. We are seeing that retrenchment in real time, and it’s occurring alongside the growth of incel movements. We tend to think of that movement as white, but we are seeing Black men in these spaces who are committed to this hatred of Black women and women more broadly. This case sits at a nexus of these various movements, both progressive and regressive colliding. The outcome of this case and the responses to it will tell us a lot more about where we are and what it means to go forward.
Watching this case unfold, I’m sure it’s only made Black women and girls less assured of coming forward given what’s at stake. But this might also move some women to come forward, since Megan came forward despite the onslaught she has faced. Those are both possible. The outcome of this case will also further reveal our very ambivalent and complicated relationship with the criminal legal system, guilty or not guilty. The way we respond in this moment is very telling. There is a selective way that we deal with the criminal legal system when we want it to dole out what we believe is justice. Because there is a Black person on both sides of this, the faith we have and the lack of faith we have in the criminal legal system will be put on display in a very robust way”.
Isaa Rae’s words, “I thought Hollywood was crazy. The music industry, it needs to start over,”, really sting and are powerful. Rap Sh!t does explore and highlight abuse that women face. It also highlights how there is this supportive and wonderful friendship. The vibrancy and vivid personalities that add so much colour and brilliance to conversations and the music. That is what needs to be celebrated and prioritised. Black women across Hip-Hop not judged when they are sexual and confident. This toxic attitude that is levied at them. You can see from the video above why the #MeToo movement has not reached Hip-Hop. Not much allyship at all from men happening. That initial thought of a Hip-Hop #MeToo was five years ago. There needs to be new support and call for one! Rap Sh!t, in addition to showcasing bonds and the amazing relationship between Black female rappers, you also get the darker side of the industry and how they are treated. There are so many things that need to happen next year regarding women in music. In terms of parity, opportunities and the way they are treated, more needs to be done to protect and listen to women. Help bring about changes in the way they are (mis)treated and represented. Misogynoir and abuse against women in Hip-Hop is a real problem. Tackling that is something that needs to be…
ADDED to the list.