I'm not really one to get caught up in online drama. I avoid anything that's fleeting and not all that important. But one thing I simply can't shy away from today was the release of Little Mixes music video for their latest song "Touch," and the immediate backlash it received. Before reading, if you haven't already, you should watch the video here.
Now I know very little about the band itself other than its music which I've actually recently become a fan of. I'm aware their fan base is, typical of pop bands, tween and teenage girls. This is the reason behind most of the backlash against the video that it is too inappropriate for their target audience, that they're "terrible role models to young girls." I have one thing to say to this; it is not Little Mixes job to be a role model to your children. It is a parents responsibility to keep an eye on what media their children are consuming and to decide if it is appropriate or not. I genuinely know parents who took their 12 year old daughter to a Little Mix concert this year and left early due the fact they thought the outfits worn by the four girls on stage were too vulgar. The parents spoke so rudely and condescendingly about the group and how had they known they would never have given such a band the money to fund the hedonistic behaviour. To me, it screamed shoddy parenting by people who knew nothing of the music and interests of their child. I was 12 once - anything I was interested in was pasted onto walls and blasted through the house. Look at what your children are interested in, judge for yourself whether it's appropriate or not and take action. Do not place such a burden onto four girls in their 20's making music. Maybe don't buy your 8 year old that €600 tablet to shut them up so it's actually possible to keep an eye on what they're consuming.
The second biggest criticism of the video is that it is just far too sexual in general, regardless of their audience. The song is about sex. Plain and simple. To think a video accompanying such a song would be anything other that a little sexual is down right naive. This opens a whole other discussion on women and sexuality. There are 36 thousand comments under this video and the biggest theme among almost all of them is that it's too sexual which has made the commenters opinion of the girls go down. Several of them called them sluts, others told the girls they should be ashamed for such behaviour.
Let's think about this shall we? What these comments basically say is that once a woman openly discusses/shares her sexuality her value therefor goes down. Much like a graph; once the openness about sexuality goes up her value as a person/woman goes down. I'm genuinely horrified that we live in 2017 and the majority of commenters underneath this video believe that a woman's value is inherently linked to her sexuality or lack thereof. Fuck off. I don't know how else to explain my disdain other than whoever still believes this can fuck off. Women are sexual beings. We shouldn't have to hide it. We damn well shouldn't worry that our value will decrease if we explore/talk about it. Women are multi faceted enigmatic people who have more than one level. We don't need to be either sexual or valued people. We can be and are both.
One absolutely great thing about this video that isn't being commended is that for once, girls are in charge. Women aren't being used as objects in this video. If you notice, almost completely opposite to every other male artists music video (which by the way never receive the same backlash as this has) the women aren't dancing for the benefit of the men in the video. The men are dancing for Little Mix. A particular scene of the video involves all four members of Little Mix sitting upon chairs looking on indifferently at the men dancing, trying to impress them. Opposed to women shaking their asses while being called sluts, whores and bitches, this video is so much more forward than 90% of the videos in its category. I applaud Little Mix for making a difference in the portrayal of women in media.
Finally, I have to agree with a lot of the negative comments. What is Perrie wearing? But that's it.
So before watching the video remember that:
1) it is no ones job to be your child's role model
2) a woman's sexuality has no correlation to her value.
3) the video is refreshing in its portrayal of women in front of the male gaze. We're not just there to be hyper sexualised without our consent and talked about like pieces of meat. We can have control too.
4) I'm sorry Perrie I'm not a fan of the nude corset.
Check back to see my next post and thanks for reading!
