A Feminist Listening of Bruno Mars

I drafted this up a while ago and never got around to hitting 'Publish' somehow. So, for a Valentine's Day special, here's a bitter rant on something meant to be romantic...

When one is looking for social truths, one rarely turns to the top 40 pop hits on the radio. After all, we all know that those California Girls can't hold a candle to us Texas gals. But sometimes, on repeated listening, a song just offends my sensibilities so much that I have to rant about it. Maybe it's my Sarah Lawrence education that turns every thought into a thesis, and Lord knows that pesky feminism can be so debilitating in day to day life. But since everyone within earshot is sick of hearing about it, it's time to pester the blogosphere.

After just a few times hearing Bruno Mars' song 'Just the Way You Are', the cute catchy song revealed some slightly unnerving lyrics. Here's my issue: this song perpetuates some really annoying stereotypes about the way girls are supposed to act. Even while it seems to be uplifting, it is in fact rather patronizing. Let's break it down.

Right in the first verse, there's her hair. It 'falls perfectly without her trying.' Because beauty isn't beauty if you know that she used her Chi and doesn't actually wake up perfectly quaffed. But a minor infraction, you say. Perhaps I'm being a bit to nitpicky.

Fine. So explain the fact that when he compliments her she won't believe him? That doesn't seem a little strange? Sure, he says it's sad. But kind of like a pleading puppy dog's eyes are sad. Low self-esteem is such a turn on. In girls, at least. Who cares if she's apparently constantly asking him if she looks okay. Better that than a confident girlfriend who doesn't rely on your lyrical hyperbole to feel attractive.

And then there's her laugh. It's so sexy. But she hates it. Am I cynical to think that part of the reason it's sexy is that very fact that she hates it? Again, why is it so important that every attractive feature be followed by her own negation of it? After all, if she didn't need you to tell her she was beautiful every day, maybe she wouldn't need you at all.

When I think of the girl in this song, I imagine that classic Hollywood cliche where the suave gentleman pulls the glasses off of his secretary and has her shake out her hair, proclaiming in surprise that she's beautiful. And she, of course, can't believe it either. Her beauty is dependent on his viewing of it, almost as much as it is dependent on her disinterest in it. After all, if she cared, suddenly she would be a vain seductress. No, there must be innocence and naivete to match the sparkling eyes and shiny hair.

I'm sorry, but this is really not that cute. It doesn't make me think that Bruno Mars is the sweetest guy and would make the nicest boyfriend. It makes me think that he's yet another media outlet telling me and every other girl to shut up and look pretty. Pretty, of course, as judged by boys. Not yourself. You have nothing to do with it.

Pause for a Girl Power Break

Okay, so there are some guilty pleasures I am actually ashamed to enjoy. Like, the whole Real Housewives franchise (along with the Watch What Happens after-show with a slightly soused Andy Cohen) for one. But some things I refuse to feel guilt over. And the Spice Girls are one.

Oh, sure, they won't be winning any Grammy's any time soon, but that was some straight-up awesome pop music that they put out there for a few years. And despite wearing truly tiny outfits, they were way more body-positive than any of today's pop princesses. It was good, old-fashioned fun. And no matter how old I am, I will alway be a screaming little teenybopper in the face of the fab five.

I missed the reunion tour because the evil overlords rescheduled the New York dates to put them smack dab after my arrival in Prague for my semester abroad. But apparently there might be a DVD of the tour on the way, because there are professional-looking videos that have leaked of a few songs. So here's my favorite for you to watch. This was the only way I could figure out to embed a YouTube video, sorry it's a little, um, sad. Look it up for the way it's meant to be enjoyed. Crank up the jam!

Taking the Shame Out of Guilty Pleasures

Why are there some things we have to apologize for liking? Songs, bands, movies, television shows, books; it seems there is a whole category of pop culture based around making those who consume it feel ashamed of it. Guilty pleasures. I'm sure everyone reading this has one. I'm sure I have more than my fair share. But lately I'm just wondering: what's the point of feeling guilty?

Maybe it's because of my newly mature 23-year-old mind, but I'm starting to think that wasting time worrying about how the world feels about my taste in music, movies and literature is pointless. It seems ironic now that there seems to be just as much power pushing us to like the Top 40 pop singles as there is shaming us if we do. There is precious little middle ground of popular artists who have enough "cred" to be considered worthy of your iPod. I wonder what gets VH1 more ratings: the insane celebrity love shows, or the talking head shows which mock them? There's really no winning. Either you become part of the millions who like the popular, derided as lemmings, or you become the cynic with taste that isn't really allowed to like anything.

And when it comes down to it, what are we ashamed of? Food is the only arena of the guilty pleasure where the base act is necessary to life. We must eat. And so eating a HoHo instead of an apple can rightly bring on some shame just because you could have taken in nutrients that weren't invented in a laboratory (but if it's not a daily habit, there's no need to obsess). But when it comes to the food for our eyes and ears, it's all kind of superfluous. No one starves when they don't read, watch television or listen to music. And so whether you read Jane Austen or Danielle Steel, there's no quantitative difference, and there's nothing physically unhealthy about it. At least you're reading! Sure, PBS documentaries can give your brain synapses a work out, especially when compared to Survivor, but it's still you sitting down and watching television. There are levels of something being a "waste of time," but they aren't hard and fast and they don't lend you a heck of a lot of moral superiority. We're all still lazy, selfish no-good bums when compared to Mother Teresa and wonderful human beings when compared to Adolf Hitler. Everything in between is mostly grandstanding.

The bottom line is this: we all need something to take our minds off of things. We all deserve to indulge in the entertainment of our choice. And no one deserves to feel bad about it.