Take this, your morals! Then, people rushed to donate blood to aid surviving victims, and money to charities supporting the widows and orphaned children of victims who didn't live. Beautiful generosity, in itself, but I was, and am, saddened that it took such a wake-up call for people to help their fellow man, instead of spending $2,000 on Jimmy Choo boots and Louis Vuitton purses. Though, the other results of the terrorist attacks sickened me more than the trendy outpouring of aid.
A war of revenge began, and thousands of innocent people were killed, apparently in an effort by George W. Bush to prove that killing innocent people is wrong. What made me almost as angry was the ban on peace promotion that followed the President's declaration of war on the abstract concept of "terror."
Celebrities that voiced their disapproval of the President's actions were ripped apart by peers, fans, and the media. Songs with anti-war lyrics—such as John Lennon's 'Give Peace a Chance'—were banned from airplay, with the flimsy, vomit-inducing excuse that listeners may be "sensitive" in the tumultuous times, and songs that reminded them of the crisis of the first world might hurt their poor little first-world feelings. I should think music about a world without war would be optimistic and uplifting. Ironically, Toby Keith's 'Courtesy of the Red, White, & Blue' was despicably overplayed; I guess its lyric "We'll put a boot in your ass, it's the American way" didn't conjure up frightening thoughts of violence quite like "All we are saying is give peace a chance." But, I digress.
I believe that almost everything that happened when the World Trade Centres fell was either stupid or righteous for the wrong reasons. This is how I feel about the world's reaction to its introduction to Janet's breast.
For one, MTV has altered its daytime music video lineup. A video in which Britney Spears wears only glitter has been deemed inappropriate for showing before ten p.m. The beginning of a clip in which Christina Aguilera dances, fully clothed, in a shower with several women is slapped with a warning for sexual material.
JC Chasez was booted from the performance roster of the NFL Pro Bowl's halftime show, in part because of his status as former bandmate to Justin Timberlake. I'll make a comparison to clue you in to how unfair this is: I was once friends with a girl, who later dropped out of school, ran away from home, got involved with a man, and became part of his life of crime. Her decisions were her own; it's not right to assume that because I was a part of the young woman's past, I am in any way responsible for any unsavoury actions she may take in the present.
Yet, music television stations continue to play rap videos featuring clubs packed with sweaty women wearing bikini tops and hot pants hiked higher up their butts than I would have imagined possible. Here are just a few videos music-television stations continue to play that could be proven just as lewd, immoral, or otherwise inappropriate for younger viewers:
- Ludacris' 'Stand Up,' in which he grinds with a woman's digitally-swollen rear end and urinates in a woman's face.
- Obie Trice's 'Got Some Teeth,' in which he urinates on a group of women, superimposes a horse's head over an overweight woman's body, and features a caricature of a woman with a dead fish emanating foul odours from beneath her skirt.
- Eminem, in various videos, has pantomined the murder and burial of his mother, shown a man locking his pregnant girlfriend into the trunk of his car and driving it into a river, burned a home to the ground, and made light of homophobic lyrics and imagery.
- Shaggy's 'It Wasn't Me,' which glorifies infidelity and encourages those caught in the act to lie.
- A rap video I saw awhile back (whose title and artist I have, fortunately, forgotten) pictured scenes of the artist in a hot tub with several bikini-clad women, pouring milk over their slick bodies.
- Timberlake's own 'Rock Your Body' (which he co-performed with Janet at the controversial half-time show) features the lyrics, Gonna have you naked by the end of this song, and his 'I'm Lovin' It' depicted him heating up the small screen with a seventeen-year-old model.
Sex is everywhere. Movies feature hot, often gratuitous glimpses of actors pretending to have sex, panning to a female's breasts or man's butt. Television shows for teens, such as Degrassi: The Next Generation, and soap operas often feature plotlines which revolve heavily around sex—a woman is pregnant with her sister's boyfriend's child, for example. Videogames and cartoons aimed at children often feature scantily-clad women with huge breasts. Commercials for everything from condoms to candy bars feature such women, and products like Pepsi cola and Reebok sneakers are endorsed by young, sexy superstars with steamy song lyrics, like Beyoncé and Usher. Society has long been giving us the impression that the more T&A they can attach to a product or slather onto a show, the better. Now, it's suddenly done a one-eighty, spontaneously declaring that two understandably-confused performers went too far, and crossed an invisible tripwire.
I don't buy for one second that this was a "wardrobe malfunction." Janet is wearing only half of a bra - the other half of the red undergarment is clearly visible beneath her corset, and she is wearing a nipple ring. Her puppies were clearly prepped for this peep show. I believe that this was a publicity stunt, one intended to be sexy, racy, and cause controversy—and it's achieved all of that. However, when one subtracts its sexual undertones, it boils down to this: It's only a breast. A natural, beautiful part of the female human body—not vulgar, not meant to be offensive. Who really gets offended by a breast? If you're sexually attracted to females, chances are that you love breasts. If you're female, you see a pair probably every day—your own. Most of us fed from breasts as infants.
Janet Jackson is not a minor. What she chose to do should not be taboo. Let legal adults in the entertainment business be as liberated with their bodies as they please. If you don't like what you see, cover your virginal darling's eyes and change the channel.
Even considering the stunt's sexual message, isn't the backlash against it ridiculous? Sex, like a breast, is natural, beautiful, and human. Perhaps if people stopped allowing television to be parents to their children, opened their mouths, and taught their children the difference between entertainment and reality, we as a society wouldn't have to panic for the welfare of these children every time we caught them playing Splinter Cell or seeing naked breasts on TV. It might surprise these parents to know that I've watched wrestling, a violent sport, and played bloody videogames like Doom, Quake, and Grand Theft Auto as I've grown up. I have also consistently scored high grades in school, have never been in a serious physical fight, have not become a teen parent or contracted an STD, have never smoked or gotten drunk, and have always lacked a criminal record, even before I turned eighteen and it would have been discarded. My three siblings also enjoyed such media, and lead similar clean lives.
The anti-flash movement's third argument was that it was in the middle of a football game, which their children were watching, innocently and unsuspecting. A friend of mine made a good point to counter this: How does one justify letting a child watch a sport in which grown men brutally beat and physically injure one another, but shrieking like a mad loon when a natural part of the body is introduced to them?
I just do not understand what all the fuss is about. Could someone please explain to me how one black artist can rap about taking drugs, having sex with lots of women, and glorifying gang violence while another black artist cannot show some natural skin? Did a tornado drop me into Taliban territory?