(ThyBlackMan.com) This week, I was thinking about Chris Brown, BET and the performance of the song with the chorus “These hoes ain’t loyal.” I’ll admit that I’m left confused by some of the feminist scholars who took issue with my article on black male sexual responsibility, yet had nothing to say when Chris Brown, Lil Wayne and BET felt compelled to celebrate the disloyalty of “hoes” around the world. I speculate that for some feminists, the rule is “I’m going to call out all disrespect for women….unless it sounds good and the singer is cute.”
There is also the case just a couple of weeks ago, where many people ignored a two hour sermon by Pastor Jamal Bryant, but focused on one sound bite during which he used the phrase “these hoes ain’t loyal” in order to explain why a man should focus on a “godly woman” and not one who is going to be available for a couple of nights. Even though Pastor Bryant also took the time to ensure that he explained that he wasn’t talking about all women with his remarks, he was eaten alive by extreme feminists who are pretty much ordered by the liberal establishment to castrate every black man who speaks on behalfs of fathers, families and black children.
I didn’t agree with Pastor’s Bryant’s particular use of words, but I saw the remarks to be one unfortunate soundbite instead of a reason to destroy decades of work on behalf of black children and families. As a father of daughters, I try to understand feminism as much as I can, while respecting the rights of men, Christians and everyone else. But I can’t help but to be taken aback by some of the borderline terroristic bullying that occurs when someone has an opinion that doesn’t agree with a pre-defined set of
ideas from which no one is allowed to deviate. I would love to live in a world where we can empower black women and respect black men as well.
Here are some thoughts about Chris Brown, Lil Wayne and “These hoes aint Loyal” that I shared on my Facebook page. I’d love to hear hardcore feminists (especially the scholars) explain this one away. But I doubt that they will, since many of them are receiving money and exposure from BET:
Speaking of “hoes ain’t loyal” I had a question for those who feel that Chris Brown’s lyrics aren’t disrespectful to women (since some feel that he was not talking to women but was instead talking about “the hoes”). Some feel that his words should be given a pass because he wasn’t talking about all women, just the “hoes.” I personally think he was speaking about all women, but I want to ask a couple of questions.
What makes a person a hoe? Let’s assume that a “hoe” is defined as a person who pushes the limits of their sexuality: They sleep with lots of people, in lots of situations, and do freaky things in the bedroom with little to no emotional return on investment.
Using that definition, I wonder this: What if you pulled back the curtain on every person’s sexuality? What if you grabbed every lawyer, professor and church girl and listed every man she’s slept with, every time she did something freaky in the bedroom, every time she slept with a man she wasn’t supposed to sleep with, or every time she’s cheated.
After seeing how disconnected her public persona is from her private one, would someone then call her a “hoe”? If that’s the case, then it seems that one could argue that most women might be technically referred to as “hoes” according to this definition. I would not personally call them hoes (since I believe that Americans are a little uptight about dealing with our repressed sexuality), but it seems that nearly any woman could fall under the “hoe” definition, unless she was so restrained that she never did anything, anywhere, with anyone that she would not want to be known about in public.
The point here is that Chris Brown’s song isn’t just talking about a subset of women….he’s talking about all of the church girls, lawyers and housewives who’ve secretly unleashed their repressed sexuality onto him without telling any of their friends what they actually did. In other words, when he says “these hoes ain’t loyal,” he’s talking about any woman who is so hypnotized by his winning smile, his soothing voice, his fame, power and money that she “makes him the exception” by doing things with him in private that she would never confess to in public. She’s more loyal to getting dirty in the bedroom than she is to her man, her image and maybe even her health….hence the term “these hoes ain’t loyal.”
I say this as a man who has heard many prominent men have private conversations about “what these hoes will do when the lights go out that they would never admit to in public.” Even as I was trying to understand why some extreme feminists were taking issue with my article telling black men to be careful about sleeping around (even my good friend, and BET employee, Marc Lamont Hill inexplicably that the article promotes “rape culture”), one person said, “Boyce, these feminists scholars talk all that stuff in public, but if you get these hoes behind closed doors, it’s a whole different story.”
I look forward to seeing if Marc, Mark Anthony Neal and other black male scholars who took issue with my article on black males and false accusations will have the courage to speak up against BET and their consistent promotion of misogynistic and self-destructive messages. They even took the time to write an open letter to me addressing my article on black males and had the audacity to argue that false accusations are so rare that they aren’t worth mentioning. I’d love to hear them share this message with the thousands of black men serving time for crimes they did not commit. Maybe their next open letter should be to BET.
Again, I’m not quick to judge a person’s sexuality, that’s their business. But I think it’s important to keep it in proper context. When rappers talk about “b*tches and hoes,” it should be offensive to all women and not just overlooked because you’re swooning over the sweet sound of his voice. R&B singers used to sing about how much they love women and are willing to do anything to have the privilege of being with them. Now they just call them b*tches and hoes and tell them to “pull their panties to the side”. That’s NOT what we should call progress. It’s what we call DISRESPECT.
Final question: What if you got Chris Brown and Lil Wayne together and asked them, “When you say ‘these hoes ain’t loyal,’ who are you talking about?” Would they say, “Oh, I’m just referring to the strippers, hookers and women who are openly promiscuous’, or would they say “any woman who acts like a hoe when she’s in bed with me?”
Then, what if I asked, “Are you only referring to openly promiscuous women or those who do things in private that they wouldn’t tell their friends?”
He would probably have a wider net than you might expect. But it’s due to the silence of sexists, groupie-fans and part-time/fly-by-night feminists that they are able to get away with this sort of thing. Oh yea, we can’t forget those who are afraid to confront BET.
Your value system shouldn’t be morphed by money and power. You have to speak up for what is right.
Staff Writer; Dr. Boyce Watkins
Dr. Boyce Watkins is the founder of the Your Black World Coalition. For more information, please visit http://BoyceWatkins.com.