Crack SF correspondent Monty Luke was the first person to hit our in-box this morning with the news that Janet Jackson's been booted from the Grammys -- which, like the Super Bowl, is a CBS production. Meanwhile, and don't tell us you didn't see this coming, Justin Timberlake has reportedly not been disinvited. And with good reason, as Monty points out - "since he's up for 7 awards, they might have a really boring show without him."
What's the takeaway here? It's ok to attack women -- all the better if done in public -- but by all means let's punish the broad who set herself up for it, the slut. I didn't weigh in on the initial halftime flap because I figured there was enough pontificating going on, but fellow Bay Area blogstraordinarie Oliver Wang said the one thing I wish I'd pointed out: "Some folks have pointed out that it's not like Justin simulated, oh, forced sodomy on Janet but ripping open someone's shirt to expose their breast - especially staged - is pretty fucked up and if you think that's a prudish thing to say, then you're probably a misogynist who gets off on that sort of shit to begin with." Doesn't fucking matter whether or not the incident was planned or staged, despite what so many people seem to find so brilliantly controversial and titillating. Whether the planning came from the board or Justin just popped a woody mid-verse at the thought of humiliating a woman on stage, the shadow of sexual violence darkly dogs the high-noon figure of some asshole's seriously bad judgement. (And I can't be the only one who's more than a little queasy at the implicit power dynamic going on - c'mon, here you've got a white boy attacking a black woman for the public eye; think he would've done that to Jessica Simpson?) And now she's getting punished for it. Well, of course. She was wearing that medieval-looking metal nipple contraction, right? Clearly she was asking for it. Hey, now that you mention it, that thing looked kinda, I dunno, magical, right, on some Lord of the Rings shit? And isn't it weird how her top popped open almost without Justin's help? She could be a witch! We'd better burn her.
I think it's time to tell our friends over at the Conservative Broadcasting Syndicate, the same network that deems MoveOn.org's populist , fiscally conservative "Child's Pay" advertisement "controversial," that they're out of line. Boycott the Grammys? Hell yes. I mean, easy for me to say; I never watch that shit anyway. And I know, boycotts come to shit, but you gotta do something.
Posted by philip at February 5, 2004 10:21 AMwhat I heard was that he was only supposed to remove an outer layer of her top, revealing the bra but not the breast. either way, it was a stupid piece of choreography, and the fact that she's getting punished for it and not him is COMPLETELY FUCKED UP.
Posted by: M Matos at February 5, 2004 01:13 PMI completely agree with Philip. CBS for me stands for Conservative Bull Shit. Of Course I would say this as I am a very leftist green peace hippy some might say :) Including myself. I think that the Grammy's should be boycotted indeed. Those right wing twits need to put a little thought into their miniscule amount of grey matter.[Now for a short aside] I mean come on, for fuck sakes North America, it's only skin! You see it on yourself when you look in the mirror! Stop being so afraid of it unless you want to start shredding your skin to bits! Ok, now that I have said that, I think this pop culture thing that is strongly influenced by rightwing dunce pots needs to start fading back into the shadows. Look at all the so called 'reality' shows. How 'real' can it really be? It's scripted and completely staged material. It is, thus, not real at all. Back to the JJ incident. No one deserves to be punished in this incident. Janet and Justin obviously consented to doing the act and the red bra thing is just a lie from tabloid white washers. Fuck Fox, CBS, NBS and whatever other fascist networks there are. Who cares if children see a breast, it's not like they are going to see it later on it life ;) As for their music, well, that's a completely different story. (What stock music company do they subscribe to anyways? Haha). I think that it's time, once and for all, to get rid of these right wing megalomaniac networks, as well as many other things. Aside->(Why the UN hasn't charged the US gov't with warcrimes in the past 13 years is a mystery to me because there are INNUMERABLE warcrimes that the US gov't has commited). As Michael Moore states in his latest book, Dude Where's My Country?,(to paraphrase) "The conservatives are a dying species, flailing about in its last attemts to breath." As long as people are intelligent, the right does not stand a chance in the world. So aside from that political rant, this year is a year for change I think, change that rids the air of mormon like morale in networks like CBS and other such bullshitting machines.
Posted by: Jesse Somfay at February 5, 2004 02:36 PM