Thursday, May 19, 2011

Who run the world? Actually I think it's men...

Her heart is in the right place. I like what this song has to say but I think it follows a trend of women being represented in the media as more powerful than they are. I'm sorry but women do not run the world. And if we're being told we do then we're less likely to keep fighting to make it actually happen.

And her lyrics are really confusing. She talks about women graduating from college, making millions and still having babies but still hopes a boy like her?

"Boy you know you love it
How we're smart enough to make these millions
Strong enough to bare the children
Then get back to business
See, you better not play me
Don't come here baby
Hope you still like me
If you hate me!"

This is super heteronormitive and completely betrays what she just said. Now in her music video, the first time she says "hope you still like me" she flips off the camera so I thought initially that it was in jest but throughout the song she's crawling around like a stripper so I thinking maybe not...

And if women were really so powerful, why does she have two men in front of her at the beginning?

Also the end, they salute the men. The women in front salute and the women behind her (I mean hundreds of beautiful dancers) stand with their hands clasped as if to prey or at least very respectful and non threatening.

I just don't know what Beyonce hopes to prove with this song and video. I mean this is the woman who gave us Independent Women! I know she wants to support women. But then she does this, or Single Ladies (a song about needing to get married!)

Anyway I just hope she knows how far away from equality we are.

3 comments:

  1. its funny you brought this up, I thought the exact thing, and remember destinys childs song cater 2 u, about being submissive to a man.

    I thought the 2 men at the start were there lil slaves, which doesn't promote equality, and the salute at the end i thought was either saying "we run the world...just kidding u do!" or "we run the world, but here we will pretend u do"

    either way she is confusing!

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  2. Hello! It seems that you might be a little confused over some of the things being said in the song/happening in the video, and I'm hoping this might clear the confusion up a bit.

    The two men in front of her were the ones that helped her come up with the dance for the song. She saw them dancing in a Youtube video and needed inspiration for a dance so she had her people look high and low for them for months until they were located. I can't remember where specifically they are from but I'm pretty sure it wasn't a first world country. Anyways, after everything they did to help her with the dance choreography, she must have decided the least she could do was give them a part in the performance.

    Also, she says "F- you, pay me" F- you, hate me" This explains why she flips of the camera at the beginning. They just censor it in the video.

    I honestly saw her crawl on the ground maybe twice through out the whole video.

    In the ending she rips off a badge from one of the men, and they don't clasp their hands together as if to pray, they ball them into fists and place one atop of the other.

    As for the saluting, this is more of a personal opinion, but the first thing that came to my mind when I saw that was that it was as if to show unity amongst the women to the men. Kind of like saying "Just try us, we dare you."

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  3. Forgive me for all the typos, I really have to get more into the habit of reading and editing before I post.

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