Escaping the Echo Chamber

[yovargas]

I suppose that depends on whether or not you count the lyrical content as part of the artistic merit.

[Alatar]

TBH, it looks like a publicity stunt. I'm reading that they polled their listeners, who voted to retain it, but they banned it anyway.

[Alatar]

[Voronwë the Faithful]

TBH, it looks like a publicity stunt. I'm reading that they polled their listeners, who voted to retain it, but they banned it anyway.

Maybe they honestly thought that playing the song was more harmful than it was worth. I certainly think so.

[Túrin Turambar]

TBH, it looks like a publicity stunt. I'm reading that they polled their listeners, who voted to retain it, but they banned it anyway.

Maybe they honestly thought that playing the song was more harmful than it was worth. I certainly think so.

My view, more or less. It's not a matter of banning the song, but deciding whether you play it on your radio station. And if you decide the objectionable aspects of the song eclipse its value, then I think it's a fair call not to play it.

[Alatar]

So this to me is a question of education. Anyone who bothers to pay attention to the song can easily see that its a reverse seduction. The woman is in control at all times, and is in fact looking for an excuse to stay that won't shock her family. In fact it was considered progressive and feminist. To ignore that now, and apply a modern lens to distort it into something its not, is to retrograde the discussion.

I'm reminded of the Washington official forced to resign because he understood language better than his listeners.
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/niggard ... -1.1258732

[Impenitent]

Well, I just listened to a couple of covers, read through the lyrics (in which the two parts are labeled "Mouse" and "Wolf", with the "Mouse" part traditionally sung by a woman), and read a social analysis which included exploration of cultural norms of the day, and...
IMO, it does describe a seduction by pressure, wearing down the woman's stated decision. Maybe she does want to stay, but her inner logic is that there will be social repercussions for her which she clearly does not want to bring upon herself, and the Wolf ignores these because of self interest.
It makes for amusing repartee but the fact is, it's not his reputation so he doesn't care and wears her down. Reverse seduction, my left foot.
It's pissy, and I feel like giving that guy a piece of my mind.
I wouldn't ban it, but I'd be using it as an object lesson in what paasive aggressive refusal to take no for an answer looks like.

Sent from a tiny phone keyboard via Tapatalk - typos inevitable.

[yovargas]

I'm sorry, Al, but I find that absurd. The lady says No, explicitly, and the guy keeps pushing. Surely you can't think that arguing that when a girl says no she's actually reverse-psychology flirting with you is a good argument, regardless of the year?

The line that gets the most attention is "What did you put in this drink?". That line makes it really hard to buy that she was "in control at all times".

[Alatar]

You know it was written by Frank Loesser and his wife as a comedy piece for a cocktail party? This IS what the song is about. Whether its a good idea to play those games nowadays is pretty clear, but you can't retroactively change peoples sexual mores to fit a current climate.

[elengil]

The song was written in 1944.

The song has merit for being progressive for 1944. It can be appreciated through that lens.

But what was progressive then is not so now. That it seems creepy and pressuring today is the modern understanding of the exchange. Given that so many people today like to take 'no' as 'convince me' means this song is highly problematic in today's climate.

Perhaps in another 70 years the song will seem like a quaint old song once again and can be played without being seen as a problem.

Social issues do come and go. There is nothing wrong with re-evaluating old media in a new light, even while appreciating that it wasn't originally intended as it is currently taken.

[Alatar]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/postever ... 53c2d9a674

This article makes most of the same points as I did, more eloquently, but draws a different conclusion. Hey, thats why we're supposed to be "escaping the echo chamber". Knee jerk agreement is lazy.

ETA: Crossposted with Elengil. Good post!

[yovargas]

Reading that article doesn't really change the exchange. She repeatedly says she doesn't want to stay, explicitly says no, and he ignores her and continues to pressure her, possibly using alcohol to weaken her resolve. Arguing that she actually, secretly wants it all along is a bad, bad argument.

[Alatar]

Except she never says she doesn't want to stay. She says she "should" go, that people will talk.

From another article:

The woman has a voice, and she’s using it to give all the culturally-understood signals that she actually does want to stay but can’t say so. She states explicitly that she’s resisting because she’s supposed to, not because she wants to: “I ought to say no no no…” She states explicitly that she’s just putting up a token resistance so she’ll be able to claim later that she did what’s expected of a decent woman in this situation: “at least I’m gonna say that I tried.” And at the end of the song they’re singing together, in harmony, because they’re both on the same page and they have been all along.

Is that the way we want people to handle dates now? No. But you can't go around rewriting history because "times have changed". That's the crux of the issue.

[Alatar]

Actually, from the same article:

So it’s not actually a song about rape - in fact it’s a song about a woman finding a way to exercise sexual agency in a patriarchal society designed to stop her from doing so. But it’s also, at the same time, one of the best illustrations of rape culture that pop culture has ever produced. It’s a song about a society where women aren’t allowed to say yes…which happens to mean it’s also a society where women don’t have a clear and unambiguous way to say no.

Which is an interesting angle. To me anyway!

[elengil]

Reading that article doesn't really change the exchange. She repeatedly says she doesn't want to stay, explicitly says no, and he ignores her and continues to pressure her, possibly using alcohol to weaken her resolve. Arguing that she actually, secretly wants it all along is a bad, bad argument.

I think we can be nuanced enough to accept that the song is not about that because it was not written to be about that. That is not the same thing as saying when a woman says 'no' she secretly means yes.

It means we accept that women are individuals, and many say no and mean no, and many men hear no and think it means 'convince me' but that does not mean there aren't some women who do want to be convinced and think it's a game, and some men who hear no and simply accept it as meaning no without argument.

It also means we can accept that this song in today's climate is very problematic without thinking the woman in this song is being drugged and date raped. Nor does it mean we ignore that many women today feel pressured to make an excuse when they don't want to stay because a simple 'no' doesn't work in many cases. So they try to give some excuse that is harder to argue against.

As Alatar's last quote points out - women have often found themselves stuck. Either they want to say yes but society does not let them, or they want to say no, but society does not let them. Women are largely told they don't know what they want, or they are teases, secretly meaning yes when they say no, or are withholding a man's due under the feeble excuse of 'headaches' (yes, a woman has to feign actual illness because men won't simply accept 'no'!)

So a song written in a time when women weren't allowed to say 'yes' would necessarily reflect that - she wants to say yes but still runs through all the reasons she shouldn't. Today when women aren't allowed to say 'no' we would logically see a very different image being painted in this song.

But that doesn't actually change the song itself. Again, the song was not written to be a woman being pressured into something she didn't want to do. And we know that, because it's a song! It is a bad song for today, but it was not a bad song in 1944.

Today when women say 'no' we should respect that, and if women want to play 'convince me' then they should be simply left out of luck. No should mean no, it should be understood and accepted to mean no, and it shouldn't require excuse after excuse to try to get out of something that is not wanted.

Acknowledging that does not require changing the past into something that it was not.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

It is remarkable how many times in the past few months I have wanted to address a subject in more depth, only to have elengil say essentially what I was going to say before I got to say it, but better than I would have.

[elengil]

[Alatar]

I agree with everything you posted Elengil, but out of curiosity Elengil, do you agree with banning the song because it can be perceived as problematic today? Or do you think its should be allowed to be played, as a curiosity of its time?

[elengil]

Unless I've missed something, the song isn't *banned* now. Certain radio stations have chosen to no longer play the song. There are lots of songs that don't get played on the radio, that does not shift them into a 'banned' category.

Anyone can still go and find and listen to the song.

Sadly, those who probably need most to understand why the song, if it had been written today, is highly problematic are the ones who seem least likely to want to engage in the conversation and will simply be angry that they banned a song for "no reason".

But again, the song has not been banned. I can pull it up on youtube right now. Anyone who calls this 'banned' likely also accuses Starbucks of waging a war on Christmas for not having snowflakes on their cups or something like that.

[Alatar]

Well, I'm using the term most associated with this in the media:

https://www.sfgate.com/local/article/Ba ... 442306.php
https://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2018/ ... d-outside/
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/arti ... tones.html