Chile....if you haven't been up on thangs, then get it ready, get it ready, get it ready baby! For the last week, give or take a day, "Throw That Boy Pussy," the first single from rapper Fly Young Red's "Pretty Boy Realness Mixtape," has had the Internet goin' nuts, not only because of its subject matter, but because of the non-stop parade of jiggling male backside.
Pull up the clip on Youtube and you'll be greeted by a litany of related reaction videos; it even became a hot topic on the Black Atheists page I frequently peruse on Facebook. Unfortunately, homophobia reared its ugly head in the comments section in both forums, the former moreso. Of course, many of the same idiots who are spewing hate and ignorance likely have zero problem with million or so other videos by straight rappers that feature the same visuals with one exception: women are making clap instead of men.
For better or worse, all those bouncing booty butt cheeks are the reason why the song has gotten so much attention. What do I think of the whole brouhaha? Honestly, I'm a little conflicted. Not about "Throw That Boy Pussy's" musical merits mind you; the track is no different than 90 to 95 percent of the other twerk-it-pop-it-dip-it-drop-it-wear-your-backbone-down-to-nub--don't-stop-it booty rap blaring from a speaker at your local hole in the wall, while the video is barely a notch or two above the skin-fests that used to air on BET Uncut. However, with all the buzz it's generating, it's bound to have an impact on people's perception of us as black gay men.
Part of me thinks "Yes. Spit that shit. Rap about busting asses out and eating it up like M&M's. Throw that shit in their face!" Meanwhile, the other, less ratchet side of me thinks "Ugh, people are gonna watch this mess and think that's ALL that we are." I've seen this point of view echoed by other black gay men on the aforementioned Facebook forum, and while I agree in principle, I can't fully co-sign.
I'm not a big believer in respectability politics. Yes, we as individuals need to make good decisions and be accountable for ourselves, the choices we make, and the things we put out into the world. However, if someone has it in their heart to hate us simply because we are LGBT or black (or both), it doesn't matter if we're as "hood" as Fly Young Red or as accomplished as Keith Boykin. It does not matter how butch we act or how degrees we earn, how many "know what I'm sayins" or "sup's" we drop into conversation, or how many times we pitch and don't catch, get dome and don't give dome: homophobes are gonna be homophobes.
Instead of worrying about how this will make us look to straight folks, fretting over whether this the "right" kind of gayness, the better course of action is creating more images of ourselves--writing our own stories, making our own music, shooting our own movies, or simply coming out to those we care about--so that this image is only one of many. 'Cause like it, love it or eh it, "Throw That Boy Pussy," or other videos of its ilk aren't going away.
For every woman who thinks GIRLS is telling her life story or the Real Housewives franchise is just entertainment, there's another who thinks both are an embarrassment to womanhood and feminism. For every black person holding a funeral for the N word, there's another claiming to take ownership of a harmful word or uttering it like they have Tourette's.
Other groups have to deal with the ratchet and respectable, and like most things in life, rarely come to a solid consensus on which is which. Why should we be exempt?
Watch the video below.
Comments
Things like 'Throw that Boy Pussy' have always and will always exist--some will love it, some (I'm assuming you) will hate it. The solution, at least IMO, is to have it be one image of many of black gay men. And really, aside from Fly Young Red's questionable usage of "boy pussy" and using the fem boys as objects, I think it's step in the right direction, as far as gay men being able to talk openly about sex.