The outrage about Cardi is based in misogyny.
I'm not burying the lede here. I really want to end there. But I'll go on.
Men have done Olympic gold medal level mental gymnastics attempting to equate her revelation to male celebrities accused of rape and I just cannot comprehend how and why they hate women THIS much. I was told that rap lyrics are fictional. Y'all, they told me that as if rappers weren't out here with real criminal records. I do not suffer under the delusion that all rappers are rapping fact. But knowing what I know about the earliest stages of hip-hop legends, not everybody is lying. I have yet to say anything about Cardi specifically. I have only refuted people's comparisons to male rappers. Because it's dumb. Saying rape is greater than robbery is not saying that robbery is right. But that seems to be the only focus. And I am wondering why and how? Why is it redemption is only for men? How is it that rappers go to jail for crimes like domestic violence, rape, attempted murder and never get muted? They come out on top of the charts and sometimes go back to jail for the same crimes and come back again. But when a female rapper admits to doing the same thing that men rap about in a profession that these rappers both revere and disrespect, men who are otherwise silent find their voice?
Something's different. It's the inherent and internalized misogyny that drives them to suddenly have their eyes opened to people's criminal pasts while still listening to people with a criminal present. Some of these same men AND women don't like Cardi in the first place because she's too free and too sexual and too honest and too loud. All things women have been taught not to be because men won't like them and eventually marry them. Cardi is the opposite of what we were taught a lady should be and yet she's popular somehow and some cannot handle it. Because everything we are taught about women is based in how they should be seen by others as opposed to how they truly want to act and feel.
Redemption, it seems, is only for men. Ice-T, who was never an actual gang member, was a pimp and a bank robber that rapped about murdering cops. He has now played a fictional cop for longer than he was a non-fictional criminal. No one has tried to mute him. But in what I can only see as retaliation for women wanting men who do bodily harm to women through crimes of power (sexual assault, rape, kidnapping) to suffer consequences, men are demanding Cardi be brought to justice. And I have to ask what's the difference?
Often times I wonder if this nation is more racist than sexist. But incidents like this remind me no, it's still HELLA sexist.
Y'all be BETTER to one another!
