Rihanna, "Man Down"

Folks, be careful- there are triggers in this post, for sure.  

I do not follow popular music.  I hate radio stations.  Songs are overplayed and I grow tired of something that might have been decent.  damn repetitive.  We also live in a society that is hyperaware of its celebrities.  I heard about this new Rihanna video where she shoots a man that sexually assaults rapes her (let’s just call it what it is so we start on the right foot).  This intrigued me.

I guess people have their underpants all rumpled up  because this video is violent.  I listened to the song, and the song is rough.  Rihanna did respond to the hubbub on her twitter with some flippant comment about  'real life.'  This was a teachable moment and I really wish Rihanna would have taken advantage of it.  But I wonder if she even knows what she is dealing with- that she at this moment has a soap box that she can stand upon.

Watch the Video if you haven’t because I am about to spoil it.

The video starts with Rihanna shooting a man in the throat and it is very graphic.  The man lies lifeless on the ground with blood pooling around his head.  This is a very alarming scene depicting very real violence.  But to leave it as just “gratuitous violence” would be missing the point completely.  Her song is not about random acts of violence.  People are not upset because the video is violent.  People are upset because the nature of the violence is a woman aggressively defending herself, they just haven’t realized it yet.    

I am pretty desensitized to violence.  My generation (the Columbine Generation) has seen it all.  Our movies and video games are horrendous.  I have an older brother and I have seen the movies he watches and the games that he plays.  However, I am not completely numb to all of the destruction.  I still feel very tender when I watch movies or certain crime centered tv shows.  When fights broke out in my high school, I remember physically shaking as I witnessed someone being beaten before my eyes.  Violence is real in this world and I know it.  

So, Rihanna is right. 


One in four women will experience domestic violence in her lifetime, and about 1.3 MILLION women are victims of physical assault by an intimate partner each year (note that the US Department of Justice says that “domestic violence is one of the most chronically underreported crimes”). And women are usually victimized by someone they know.  

One of my favorite documentaries, This Film is Not Yet Rated, talks about the rating system for movies (MPAA) in the USA.  Watch this film and let it blow your mind (watch instantly on Netflix).  The film examines lots of issues dealing with censorship and the portrayal of life in film.  The big debate in the film is about sex and violence.  The things that the MPAA deems appropriate for 13 year olds to see are rape, violence (murder galore, beatings, gun violence, blood splatters, bloody massacres), and sexual violence.  The things they thought children couldn’t see were females having sexual pleasure.  


Let me say that again.  


It is okay to see women get beaten and raped and shot, not okay to see them in a consenting and positive sexual encounter that results in an orgasm.  They also discuss at length the complications they found while trying to come up with a rating about a documentary on the Iraq war and the life of soldiers (uncensored, unfiltered, unscripted).  The soldier's use the foulest of language and the footage is graphic and violent.  It seemed like the documentary almost broke the MPAA rating system.  They couldn't seem to agree on how to handle the content because it wasn't a scripted movie.  The situation is complicated.  How do you rate real life?  

Rihanna's flippant twitter response about her video depicting real like reminds me of this MPAA conundrum.  

I finally watched the video for myself and noted:

1. Yes, that is some graphic violence, she shoots a man in the throat and he dies
2. Rihanna depicts herself as a vibrant and beautiful member of the community
3. She hugs children and kisses old women and greets people kindly
4. She goes out to a club for a night of fun and dancing
5. She dances with an attractive young man
6. He comes on strong but she pushes him away
7. She heads home looking happy
8. He follows her home and attacks her
9. She fights him, loses and is raped 
10. She is crumbled in an alley
11. She gets up, runs home, and pulls out  gun hidden in her home

I am not advocating that someone should emulate her if they find themselves in her position.  But I am hoping that people think critically about the content of her video.   

Our culture swallows the horrid reality that, on a regular basis, women are physically and emotionally beaten, and raped, and killed.

Our culture swallows whole that that sort of thing is okay for 13 year olds to see in films.

Charlie Sheen, Woody Allen, Roman Polanski, Chris Brown, R. Kelly.  Abusers of women.  Rapists.  Molesters.  There are many more we do not know about.  We praise these men.  We pay them.  We do not punish them.  We do not hold them accountable.  Chris Brown threw a chair at a window in his dressing room on the set of Good Morning America because they asked him about beating Rihanna.  Did they press charges?  No.  

I am not advocating vigilante justice, but I imagine that if any of their victims when after these men, they would be charged and tried.  Maybe if the justice system and our culture served victims of domestic violence and sexual violence better, Rihanna’s video would upset me.  

I think most folk do not have a problem with Rihanna’s video depicting rape.  What got them going was that a woman got up off the ground and killed her rapist.  That act upsets the balance of our created universe of sex/power/control/gender dynamics.  The video spits on the patriarchy.  

This video is alarming and disturbing- do not get me wrong and go bat shit in the comments section.  Her previous song about domestic violence “Like the Way You Lie,” literally makes me nauseous.  My stomach churns just thinking about what that song means.  When I first heard the lyrics, I knew what it was about; a woman in an intimate relationship with a partner who beats her, he keeps beating her and apologizing, she keeps staying even though she knows its a lie, it escalates and he eventually kills her.  This video has over 6.5 million hits.  My father-in-law said he liked the song.   

I was horrified by the lyrics because I know that this shit is real.  When I finally saw the video, I was almost sobbing by the end of it, because I know that domestic violence and intimate partner homicide is on the rise.  I want to know why more people are not infuriated over that video.  But I already know why folks are not upset by it.

That kind of behavior is silently approved. 

When a man beats a woman she deserved it (I have heard male comedians joke about this).   

I encourage you to self-educate.  Read these facts on domestic violence (I quote a lot of them).  Read anything that Inga Muscio writes.  Read Yes Means Yes about rape culture.  And for the love of god, do not watch movies or support films that depict ladies getting beaten and raped without thoughtfully talking about them.