Summer Song Challenge, Day 82: Joe

Prompt: "I dunno... something about a banana or whatever"

Selected by Joe

"Hey Banana"

BNQT

Volume 1, 2017

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"whatever":

As we usually do every Friday morning, I'm opening up the proverbial mailbag and reaching in to see what kind of feedback our loyal readers have provided for us. This is the Puke on Your Birthday weekly Ask a Blogger feature.

Let's see... whoops, this letter I have here is addressed 5/17/19. I'm a little late in answering it. Sorry, friends. But it's never too late to give voice to the readers. Here ya go.

Reader:

Your [Lizzo] review is dumb.

Your review is dumb because for decades, well forever, women are told what to be and how to feel. The fact that you are annoyed by Lizzo being confident makes you a perpetuator of this. I don't like that. Women are shamed for being confident. We are told that we are cocky, bossy, cunts, etc. Lizzo is a fat black girl. She is sexual in a way that fat people aren't allowed to be in the media and WE NEED THAT. So shut the fuck up. 

Also, I didn't read the whole thing because you write too much. Brevity works too, bruh.

Joe's response:

Thanks for not mincing words, dear reader. I'm happy to be held to task for what I write. I barely get any feedback on any of my blog posts at all, from anyone, so it sincerely does make me feel nice that someone is out there reading PoYB, and feels strongly about something that I put down in digital ink, one way or the other.

While I would argue that my review at the time addressed some of these concerns head-on—though through a really annoying fake courtroom framework, so I can completely understand why you didn't read the whole thing—maybe the past four years have, um, changed the situation just a little bit.

Yikes. I guess we've seen the Lizzo accusations. Hostile work environment, sexual harassment, even fat-shaming. Not a good look. We here at PoYB believe accusers in these situations. We believe that power corrupts, and that Lizzo used her power to make victims of her employees. Look, I don't know the whole situation, and maybe I don't care to, but from what I do know, there's no reason to believe that Lizzo isn't a shitty person at best, and a sex criminal at worst.

That sure doesn't make me feel good at all. You might assume that it does, and I guess that's why I'm setting the record straight here. I take no perverse pleasure in other people's pain. "Other people" in this case primarily being Lizzo's victims, and then Lizzo herself (who, even if she did do all the fucked up shit that's alleged of her, is probably feeling really fucking shitty right now), and then also Lizzo's fans, both former and current, all those who bought into her Ponzi scheme of #GirlBoss #Positivity. In light of the allegations, everything just feels gross on like ten different levels.

There will be no "I told you so" on my end. I didn't tell you so. What I told you was this: the positivity, the "confidence," the feminism and feel-good platitudes, all of it seemed extremely calculated, a plastic product. This was a gut reaction in hearing the music. I stole the phrase "toxic positivity" from someone, and I believed it applied to Lizzo. And yes, I guess there was some measure of correctness in this assessment. It was indeed just an act. Lizzo herself was fat-shaming others and worse, which is insane. But in my latest opinion, it seems like I landed on "it's okay that I don't buy into this, because there are tangible benefits for all those who do." I cannot claim a bullseye. Far from it.

Our reader who sent the letter in today—and hey, thanks, dear reader, I really appreciate you, hope all is well—seems to have gained confidence from Lizzo, and I think that's great. That's why I don't feel good about it being a sham, because Lizzo's scheme blew up and her fans are feeling the aftershocks (not even mentioning the first-degree victims, who, again, should be believed wholeheartedly, and supported). 

I do feel a bit more at ease in the world in finally knowing the truth, though. Let me explain, if I can.

Okay, so back in college, there was a dude who I knew through an extracurricular. I didn't even go to school with the guy, but he hung around a little bit after he had graduated, which was totally fine—I wouldn't have met my wife if she hadn't done the same that one time, so there's that—but there were a few instances in which he came off kinda... creepy. Nothing explicit, just things that me and my friends felt slightly uneasy about. Maybe even in ways that weren't articulated. A couple left-of-center remarks or uncomfortable actions at a party that made me and the people I associated with (I think, but don't let me speak for anyone else but myself) kinda glad that he wasn't currently in school. (I also recall at least one good conversation with the guy, one in which he was legitimately helpful to me emotionally, so it wasn't overwhelming, that feeling of unease. Slightly more bad than good, though.)

He had his staunch defenders as well. The whole extracurricular group (I'm being as vague as possible here, so as to not step on anyone's toes, since I live in fear that any number of long-ago college acquaintances are going to show up in the comment section of this blog hollering about their toes being stepped on) was divided, more or less, into two cliques. Maybe "cliques" isn't the right word, I don't know. It wasn't Sharks v. Jets or anything. I counted a lot of good friends in the opposing clique, and find myself even today reminiscing fondly about some of the good times we all had together, even though, in this post-graduation world, the hangouts with the other kids in that extracurricular are few and far between. But still, main point here: their "patriarch," as it were, was kinda creepy, for reasons that I wouldn't have been able to explain, were you to ask me at the time.

Cut to a few years later, and he's a registered sex offender. The situation, from my insanely removed standpoint, is still a little complicated, morally speaking. One, he raped an eighteen-year-old student, according to the letter of the law, "rape" because she was his student, even though she was eighteen and consenting. So rape in the least rapey way, I guess... that sounds wrong, but you get what I'm saying. The dude imploded his whole fucking life over this, and rightly so. So no, I won't defend the absolutely atrocious thing he did. But no, I also won't say that he deserves to fuck off and die because of it either, since every person deserves the chance to make amends, and if the perpetrator of a crime, no matter what that crime was or how serious, makes an honest and focused effort in making amends to the victim directly, according to the emotional wants and needs and requests of the victim themselves, and is sincere about their efforts to change and make amends and do what they have to do to get there, then that person, in that hypothetical scenario, should be worthy of forgiveness, regardless. This is my social worker side talking, and I believe it when I say it.

But putting all that aside for a second (and also not even fucking going near some subsequent drama that occurred between still opposing sides of this extracurricular group rather recently, since I wasn't anywhere near it and have no say in what occurred), here's my point. I felt like the dude was kind of a creep when I knew him back in the day. I couldn't tell you why but I felt it in my gut that there was something off. And when he was found guilty of a serious sex-related crime, it kind of retroactively justified my initial gut reaction. Right? It was a terrible situation for all parties involved, but at the same time, the fact that it happened totally made sense, according to my innate understanding of the world. I felt something to be true without being able to explain it, and then later, I was able to explain it with new information. I don't want to say "I was right," because I couldn't articulate what ended up being the truth. But the feeling I felt was in the ballpark of "I was right." It was like... I was right to trust my gut that something was off. That's all.

Sorry for the wild tangent there. But this connects to the whole thing with Lizzo in a pretty obvious way. Yes, of course I am against fat-shaming, and I am in total support of anything that gives young women confidence in any way, and of course someone with Lizzo's body type has the right to be sexy and the ability to be sexy and I am all for changing society's fucked up stigma in that regard. But through it all, even beyond the shitty plastic pop music, I really did feel in my gut that something was off about Lizzo. That the whole edifice that she had built for herself and her hashtag-girl-boss-power-whatever was made of cheap rotting stucco. I could never explain why I felt that way. I thought it was just me being an asshole, and maybe in some ways I was. But hearing the allegations against Lizzo, it lessened that internal tension for me almost completely. I hate that I have to put it this way, but I do: it made the world make a little bit more sense. There is no more confusion about Lizzo. I no longer dislike her for reasons that I do a shitty job of articulating or maybe couldn't at all; I now dislike her because she's a demonstrably shitty person. The world is complicated enough, but it gets less complicated now.

This is all like the least important thing about all this, and I am sincerely regretful that I am wasting so much oxygen on it. Here's what's important: that Lizzo's victims are provided with the opportunity to experience justice. Here's also what's important: that Lizzo faces consequences (based on the conceited way her "response" was worded, it doesn't look like "making amends" is going to be in her future any time soon).

Maybe we can find grace in the existence of more worthy role models, of which there are many out there, and all of whom I will support, even if the music isn't necessarily my thing. I think what Lizzo pretended to preach was important, and the fact that she was a piece of shit doesn't negate the message. That message is still out there, and I hope that a real, honest person is able to hold the banner after Lizzo fades away. I also hope that the next wave of feminism-via-pop-star can look like empathy for the victims of capitalism, instead of an emulation of the "bosses" who inflict pain within the system of capitalism. But maybe that last point is another blog post for another time.

And finally, dear reader who sent in today's letter, I want to apologize for not heeding your advice in your final sentence. I don't think I'll ever be able to be brief when it comes to blogging. I wrote too much here, but I find comfort in the fact that no one is still reading this anyway.

Send all mailbag questions to: pukeonyourbirthday@gmail.com!!

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"banana":

a video of a bat eating a banana