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Inappropriate: Phawker's post on gang rape creeps us out
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Inappropriate: Phawker's post on gang rape creeps us out
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So I'm reading one of the most horrifying stories to come out of New Jersey/anywhere in a while, posted on Phawker (via the Associated Press), about a 7-year-old girl who was gang-raped by as many as seven men, after being sold to these men by her 15-year-old stepsister.
Sad, sad, sad world, right?
And then I look to the image (see above) that Phawker ed Jonathan Valania posted to accompany the story. Wait, what? — is he likening this 15-year-old who sold her own sister away to become a sex slave as someone who should go and brush her shoulders off???
Now look, we could get into a long discussion here about how Jay-Z and every other rapper since the beginning of time has glorified pimps, and how that's not cool. But the fact is, in the context of Jay-Z's "Dirt Off Your Shoulder," "pimp" is a metaphor — and the phrase "ladies is pimps, too" is an empowering statement, one of solidarity. No one who commits such a heinous crime as that mentioned above should be compared to a woman who deserves to brush her shoulders off.
Which is long way of saying that, essentially, Phawker's post creeped me the fuck out. Worse yet, it isn't the first time.
As much as rappers would like you to pretend that the word "pimp" doesn not mean a pimp, the story of the public housing child gang rape involves a teen pimp who sells a little girl. Not quite so fun to blast that rap song now, is it?
Nah, I agree that glorifying pimps anywhere is bad, Cleanup. All I meant was that the discussion over rappers doing it has been had many times before, and I just didn't feel the need to reiterate it at this time. And I do think that, in a weird way, Jay-Z probably meant that specific lyric ("ladies is pimps, too") to be empowering and pro-women.
Actually, the fact that Phawker de facto celebrated a teen pimp, by likening her to a woman in a song lyric that itself glorifies pimps further is meta mindfuck.
And I suppose, in that way, Phawker could have been posting that image ironically. If that's true, I'd still argue that it's damaging to do so, because I seriously doubt many people would "get" it.In the immortal words of Charlie Brown: Good grief. Your reaction to a story about a 15-year-old pimping out her 7-year-old stepsister for a gangrape is to complain about the graphic I grabbed off of Google Images to accompany the story? That's like hearing about the Holocaust and complaining that the striped pajamas the Jews had to wear in the concentration camps made their asses look big. Also, if you keep roasting marshmallows at Joey Sweeney's bonfire of the inanities you are only going to get burned. Trust me on this. In the immortal words of Animal House's Dean Wormer: Fat, drunk and Sweeney is no way to go through life, son.
Few people have recognized the 15-year-old girl as a victim too. She's a minor, and that qualifies as statutory rape. Her role in her sister's rape may be sensational but an abused teen's actions aren't the same thing as the adult men who took sick, sick actions on both these children.
Not really buying that analogy, Jon. The image accompanying the story is a commentary on that story. And, in this case it signals a callous disregard for a tragic event. Don't think it's really what you intended, but it was a funky choice of images, to say the least. Oh, and Holly's the last person I'd accuse of being a sycophant. Trust me, son.
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