AnonymousI have to ask: Harm to who? To white women? To “women” as a category? To black women?
I agree that it’s damaging to expect women to compete for attention (especially black women), given the fact that American pop culture adheres to the whole “only room for one black female rapper” thing. I also can see how that behavior might be read as playing into stereotypes about women, and black women in particular. But by the same token, I’m not okay with asking those same black female rappers to adhere to a stricter code of be-nice-to-each-other conduct than we ask of white women, or men. Especially considering how “shitting on your haters” is like 99% of Nicki’s philosophy (and I love that). I mean, white people regularly praise Amanda Palmer for doing similar things to other white women. When Madonna does it, she’s just being Madonna. When Nicki Minaj does it, she’s setting back feminism, or whatever.
I’d also like to ask: what is generally objectifying about Minaj’s career? Is it her body? Is it the fact that she sings and raps about sex? No one could ever in a million years convince me that Nicki is ~objectifying herself~ in the “Super Bass” video. What about “Fly?” “Moment 4 Life?” I never understand that criticism of Nicki’s solo career, and it smells like an assumption made about black women’s bodies and an imposition of meaning onto them. Nicki Minaj does sexy stuff. Nicki Minaj has a big booty. Nicki Minaj is not “doing more harm than good” by doing sexy stuff and having a big booty. Or anyway: if we are allowed to find Gaga’s appropriation of sluttiness empowering (and I might!) even though sometimes it aligns with stereotypes, why can’t we do that with Nicki? What is with this incessant public stripping of black women’s sexual agency?
Still, I think there’s a conversation to be had here. Nicki consistently plays with gendered, racialized tropes. Nicki does this with intention and intelligence. We know this, and if you deny her agency in this regard, then you might be acting racist.
Still, a lot of black women find her appropriation of these tropes to be damaging, partially because of Nicki’s sizeable white audience. So, like: no, Nicki should not be held responsible for objectification of women. Nicki’s big booty should not be a signifier in white conversations for black women’s sexuality as a damaging force to feminism.
I’m going to close with a piece in Feminism FOR REAL. It’s an essay called “Pride from Behind” by Shabiki Crane:
I was truly “done” with women’s studies after my professor announced to the class that when white women like Britney Spears presented themselves in a sexual manner it was because they were asserting their sexuality; however when black women, like Beyonce did, they were simply being puppets and degrading themselves. I couldn’t understand the way that both images wouldn’t invoke the same reaction regardless of whether it was seen as empowerment or degradation, but why not the same? I saw two women singing, shaking, shimmying and to my horror, recognized it would never be the same. It just reiterated the feelings of dis-empowerment I had harboured throughout the years of my life.
