Hyper-masculinity and Rape Culture

An analysis of our popular media, especially music videos, reveals a culture of hyper-masculinity, which promotes aggressive behavior towards other men, racial animosity and sexual-based violence against women.

Music videos are a great site of investigation because cultural icons such as music stars get to express themselves in short snippets which capture social expectations of what will be popular, as well as reflect and influence reality. Culture is a place where intersectionality occurs and is easily observable. Music is a site of cultural expression, and an important one, as “music historically has been a medium for human social expression” and it “served to stimulate the mind, stir the soul, and elicit emotions” (Adms & Fuller, 2006, p. 938-939).

An analysis of popular music videos reveals some interesting things related to:

- Normative Sexuality

Music videos are the epitome of normative sexual representation. Queerness is practically nowhere to be found as most music videos have typical male and female protagonists engaging in sexualized behavior. Sex is obviously a big selling point; so is being “sexy” or “provocative” in either “white” or “black” terms. For example, stars like Lady Gaga and Miley Cyrus, present a very androgynous, perhaps controversial or “weird” yet still normative sexuality. You can check out examples here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bESGLojNYSo (Lady Gaga, “Poker Face”)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=My2FRPA3Gf8 (Miley Cyrus, “Wrecking Ball”)

Black stars, such as Beyonce and Nicki Minaj flaunt their curves, presenting a very racialized, unapologetic sexuality.

You can check out some examples:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VBmMU_iwe6U (Beyonce, “Run the World”) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDZX4ooRsWs (Nicki Minaj, “Anaconda”)

Hyper-masculinity as a racial paradigm One of the main features of music videos from the last 20 years reveal ongoing class and racial struggles. These struggles are obvious every day in the news, especially in the aftermath of police killings of unarmed youth, “Black Lives Matter” movement, “Occupy Wall Street” movement and more recently “Blue Lives Matter” movement.

Hyper-masculinity means promoting oneself in an aggressive, “machismo” way, promoting a phallocentric view of worthiness and virility. Black men are “manly,” straight, masculine, overly virile and well-endowed. They aggressively pursue and engage in sexual relations with women in order to prove themselves virile. Iwamoto (2003) explains that “young men of color often enter into hyper-masculine behaviors to combat the degrading effects of racism on their self-esteem,” but since many hip-hop artists promote macho, tough and hyper-masculine ideals, the fans internalize these personas and “there is great pressure to conform to the limited masculine ideals provided by the cultural media” (p. 45). The argument can be made that this western version of machismo is affecting how young people see themselves, the role models they should follow, and puts pressure on them to continue being overly aggressive. What is more “due to poverty and neglect, black youth are often deprived of and under-exposed to cultural influences that differ from those of the mass media, which often negatively or one-dimensionally depict black men as villains, murderers, gang members, boxers (Latinos), and martial artists (Asians)” (Iwamoto, 2003, p. 45).

If mass media is educating our children, then what kinds of lessons are they getting? Italic text

Bryant (2008) posits that “music videos, in general, tend to have well-defined demarcation of gender roles, especially in relation to sexuality,” and “tend to portray gender role-stereotyped behaviors,” while “rap videos are more likely to be sexist in that females are depicted as sex objects more in rap videos than in order genres of music videos” (p. 357). At the same time, “African American adolescents report using television for dating scrips and relationship guidance” (Bryant, 2008, p. 357). What exactly are they learning? This culture also does not allow for non-heteronormative behaviors. Members of the LGBTQ community are excluded or made fun of, as “gay” is a negative term in “hip-hop.” As Ryan Lewis says in his famous “One Love,” “If I was gay, I would think hip-hop hates me.” The role models promoted by the media, such as actors, singers and sports figures, “have always been tough, aggressive, ultra-competitive, strong, and dominating” (Iwamoto, 2003, p. 45). This hyper-masculine attitude translated into a culture of misogyny, which is “the hatred or disdain of women,” “an ideology that reduces women to objects for men’s ownership, use or abuse” (Adams & Fuller, 2006, p. 939). Iwamoto (2003) talks specifically about Tupac Shakur as a role model and finds that he, like many other super-stars today, promoted suggestive, tough behavior, wanted to be affiliated with the “thug life,” instigated mob-like behavior, praised gang life, and presented himself as “hypersexual,” even though he himself admitted that women live in a “rape culture” (p. 46). Adams & Fuller (2006) also find that “misogyny in gangsta rap is the promotion, glamorization, support, humorization, justification, or normalization of oppressive ideas about women” and, in many videos, we can see how women are reduced to just this (p. 940). What is more, African American women are particularly targeted as “objects that are only good for sex and abuse and are ultimately a burden for men,” and this attitude can be reflected in different ways “from mild innuendos to blatant stereotypical characterizations and defamations” (Adams & Fuller, 2006, p. 940).

Rape Culture

If cultural expectations and role models put forward hyper-masculine, aggressive sexuality which needs conquests to exist and thrive, then the argument can be made that this aggressiveness promotes a rape culture. In spite of feminist, social, political and legal efforts to reduce sexually-based offences against women, sexual assault continues to be a widespread phenomenon.

What is “rape culture”? Italic text

Khan’s (2017) argues that rape culture refers to “the normalization and eroticization of sexual aggression and violence in social and cultural practices” (p. 20).

Lady Gaga’s “Till it happens to you” shows the reality of sexual assault and rape everyday on college campuses in America.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZmWBrN7QV6Y (Lady Gaga, “Till it happens to you”)

Why is sexual assault, rape and generally aggressive behavior so widespread in the media? Can we “see” rape in everyday media productions? Certainly.

Take a look at some popular videos from the past few years: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UecPqm2Dbes (Enrique Iglesias, “Tonight I’m loving you”) – This is the radio-friendly version but the original was saying something else. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yyDUC1LUXSU (Robin Thicke ft. Pharrell, “Blurred Lines”) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uelHwf8o7_U (Eminem, ft. Rihanna “Love the way you lie”) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfjtpp90lu8 (Jamie Foxx, “Blame it on the Alcohol”) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cB5e0zHRzHc (Usher, “Love in this Club”)

Even though these videos might not be explicitly promoting sexual assault, some of the lines in the songs are problematic to say the least, because they have aggressive and hyper-masculine connotations. Some examples include:

“I know you want it” – How do you know? Do all women want it? Consent? “Tonight I’m “loving” you” – Is that a promise or a threat? “Stand there and hear me cry…that’s all right” – How is that all right? “If she tries to leave again, I’m gonna tie her to the bed and set this house on fire” “I’m leaving you …no, you ain’t” “She don’t wanna seem like she easy” “…tell me what you’re sipping on…and I promise that I’m gonna keep it coming all night long” – Alcohol always seems to be a man’s best friend if he wants to “make love” in a public place.

These are just a few examples, taken from radio-friendly songs. Going deeper into heavy rap or hip-hop songs would reveal a much darker picture. At a glance, the over-usage of terms like “bitch” and “ho” in music create certain images and stereotypies, and “their use and the images they create oppress women as a group” (Adams & Fuller, 2006, p. 949). Khan (2017) mentions the birth of a new feminist awareness of music which is considered as instigating sexual assault, in so-called “rapey tunes” (p. 19-20). As Khan himself mentions, “rapey songs” or “rapey lyrics” might seem offensive, yet, it is important to analyze media and reality that “rape is not primarily an isolated violation perpetrated by a stranger and that sexually violent themes weave through the tapestry of everyday life, including the entertainment industry” (p. 21). These “rapey” songs are not an isolated phenomena but just a symptom of “a larger social, cultural, and economic system that sustains and perpetuated the ideology;” an ideology in which misogyny, hyper-masculinity, race and gender intersect (Adams & Fuller, 2006, p. 941).

References

Adams, T. M., & Fuller, D. B. (2006). The words have changed but the ideology remains the same: Misogynistic lyrics in rap music. Journal of Black Studies, 36(6), 938-957.

Bryant, Y. (2008). Relationships between exposure to rap music videos and attitudes towards relationships among African American youth. Journal of Black Psychology, 34(3), 356-380.

Iwamoto, D. (2003). Tupac Shakur: Understanding the identity formation of hyper-masculinity of a popular hip-hop artist. The Black Scholar, 33(2), 44-49.

Khan, U. (2017). Fetishizing music as rape culture. Studies in Gender and Sexuality, 18(1), 19.