Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!usc!orion.oac.uci.edu!ucivax!gateway
From: loren@dweasel.llnl.GOV (Loren Petrich)
Newsgroups: soc.feminism
Subject: Madonna and Music Video (was Re: KILLING US SOFTLY...)
Message-ID: <88812@lll-winken.LLNL.GOV>
Date: 7 Jan 91 07:02:16 GMT
References: <2782472C.21585@ics.uci.edu> <1991Jan3.054848.25654@ims.alaska.edu>
Organization: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
Lines: 130
Approved: tittle@ics.uci.edu
Nntp-Posting-Host: zola.ics.uci.edu


	The question was raised about sexual exploitation in music
videos and what the music-video station MTV shows a lot. There was an
interesting perspective on this question provided in the course of a
controversy not too long ago. The name of Madonna Louise Ciccone, a
woman who usually uses only her first name, should be familiar to all
of you people by now. She is a dancer/singer/songwriter/actress who
has generated controversy after controversy after controversy, often
from her unabashed expressions of sexuality. She has earned the enmity
of professional prudes like the Rev. Donald Wildmon, who claimed that
her making out with a saint in "Like a Prayer" was blasphemy, and of
feminists for alleged sexual exploitation, acting like a greedy gold
digger in her "Material Girl" video, and for supposedly glorifying
teenage pregnancy in her song "Papa Don't Preach." Most recently, her
video for her song "Justify My Love" was banned from MTV, whose
executives accused it of being too raunchy for their tastes.

	In an early statement, she asked why people were willing to
watch someone get blown to bits for no reason at all, but were
reluctant to watch two men snuggling or two "girls" kissing. According
to her, the video represented one person's fantasies, evidently hers.
She appeared on Nightline late last year, and stated her case in an
interview with Forrest Sawyer. I obtained a transcript of that
interview, and here is how it went. After an introductory blurb, the
station showed the video itself, which was a weird make-out session
shot in black-and-white and featuring Madonna herself, her current
boyfriend Tony Ward, and some other people. We see Madonna in black
lingerie, and another woman wearing nothing but suspenders above the
belt. The two women actually kiss, with mouths open, at one point. One
net.person commented that this video was something like a bad French
porn movie.

	In the interview, she said she thought she could get away with
bending MTV's no-nudity rules once again, as she had with her video
for "Vogue", where one can see her barely-concealed breasts. She said
she decided to go ahead with making the video, though she did feel
worried about all the conservatism on the loose. When told that this
was a win-win situation for her, and that she would be making even
more money by putting out her video as a single, she only commented,
"Yeah, so lucky me."

	When asked where she draws the line on what she will put into
her videos, she stated that she draws the line at violence and
humiliation and degradation. When asked about her (in)famous video
"Express Yourself," where she crawls on the floor and is chained to a
bed, she stated that she was being enslaved by her own desires, that
there was no man doing that to her.

	He asked her what about showing sexuality on TV, she suggested
that MTV can have a violence hour and a degradation to women hour, as
well as an adult-sexuality hour -- headed with warnings about what's
coming so parents can keep such things from their kids if they want
to.  According to her, why is it OK for kids to watch Sam Kinison
spitting on Jessica Hahn, but not two consenting adults displaying
affection for each other, regardless of their sex? Forrest Sawyer
conceded that Madonna had raised about 30 interesting questions to
examine.

	After the break, Forrest Sawyer asked Madonna whether she
would want her own kids watching something sexually suggestive. She
responded that she wouldn't be worried, and that she hoped that her
video would provoke some discussion of sex between kids and their
parents. According to her, too many Americans want to sweep sexuality
under the rug, as it were. He commented that kids might get confused
by some peculiar sexual fantasies, and Madonna suggested that that
might be a very good idea. She once again complained about why the TV
networks are so willing to show violence, but not sexuality, and
complained that the networks will not even show ads for birth control.
He pointed out that the common counterargument was that it is up to
the parents, and she responded by charging that a lot of parents are
simply not doing their jobs, when one considers all the teenage
pregnancies and heterosexual AIDS cases. She insisted that she was
being very responsible, that her video was about people being honest
about their sexuality, that she deals with sexuality a lot, that she
tries to promote safe sex, and that she never tries to promote
gratuitous violence and degradation.

	He asked her what she would say to the feminists who complain
that what she does is un-feminist, and she pointed out that, in
whatever she does, she is the master of her own fate, even when she
acts like some stereotypical bimbo. "And isn't that what feminism is
all about, you know, equality for men and women?"

	Forrest Sawyer asked her what is the next thing we can expect
from her, "You want me to promote one of my products, my up-and-coming
products?", "My up-and-coming, button-pushing, products?" But she
conceded that she will probably explore sexuality further, and that
that is a very important issue for her. She ended with "Thank you for
listening to me."

	In the interview, Madonna seemed a bit nervous, as if these
were difficult subjects for her, or else she felt that she was not
getting her message across. But I think she held up rather well, and
posed some very GOOD questions. Why have shameless sexual exploitation
and degradation, but not loving sexuality? Why is violence OK, but not
sex? Why not have special times of day (or night) for showing anything
sexually suggestive?

	There are some questions for feminists, also. Many feminists
have had only too much experience with sexual exploitation, and it is
only natural that some feminists think that most heterosexual sex is
fundamentally degrading to women (Andrea Dworkin comes to mind). I
hope that feminists will take on the question of non-exploitive,
non-degrading portrayals of sexuality.

	And Madonna certainly does not degrade men (let us say) the
way that all too many videos degrade women. David Lee Roth's videos
come to mind pretty quickly, although DLR has the saving graces of
being something of a male bimbo himself and of being thoroughly
cartoonish. The Power Station made some truly degrading videos some
years back, and they had no sense of humor. It's true that Madonna
likes to show off her shapely body, but the context does not seem
exploitative to me.

	And I appreciate that here is someone willing to defend her
position on some important issues, instead of sounding dishonest and
evasive. And here is one prominent person who does not think that
sexuality is something that must be hidden from kids, no matter what
it takes. I point that out because there is a school of thought which
states that children are innocent little sexless darlings, who must be
shielded at whatever the cost from anything that suggests sex, lest
they becomes sex-crazed lunatics.


$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
Loren Petrich, the Master Blaster: loren@sunlight.llnl.gov

Since this nodename is not widely known, you may have to try:

loren%sunlight.llnl.gov@star.stanford.edu