"This Is Me... Then"
2002
by RAIL Albany, March 2003
In our celebrity-obsessed culture, more attention is given to the persynalities and lifestyles of so-called artists than any actual message or aesthetics. Media outlets such as People magazine and Entertainment Tonight are more interested in the clothes rich people wear than the words that come out of their mouths. Such an atmosphere breeds the most shallow and vapid form of celebrity: celebrity in-itself. Esteemed not for any achievement in any artistic endeavor, the celebrity in-itself is actually known for being a celebrity, rich and famous because they are rich and famous.
Jennifer Lopez can be seen as the archetype of this socially offensive phenomenon. More widely known for her body and her various romantic interludes, record companies will shell out millions to record and promote her albums; not because they believe in the quality and concepts behind the music, but rather that if they place a picture of her partially exposed bosom on the cover, cds are guaranteed to fly off the shelves. Her label will spend more money than the gross domestic product of many oppressed nations to produce a three and a half minute video of her lip syncing in a bikini.
Like most pop artists, the vast majority of Lopez's songs are about sex, typically in the pretense of love songs. Her latest album, nonsensically titled This is Me…Then, includes the paean for latest celebrity boyfriend Ben Affleck, "Dear Ben." With lines that would embarrass a love struck fourteen year old, Lopez extols their physical relationship. "Seems I'm addicted to the way you like to touch me, I don't think they understand, why I love at your command…" "You make my body feel about a million different things…" and so forth. While many Latina womyn in Amerika face gender oppression, Lopez's millions of dollars give her a privileged status, superseding her gender and national identity. In her position, sex can be a fun and nonchalant experience, as she is at least the social equal of any partner she might have. With this, she paints a false picture for her less economically fortunate female fans of their gender role, spreading the concept that they can harmlessly use and enjoy sex in their relationships. "Dear Ben" ends with line, "Sometimes I feel like I'm livin' in a fantasy." On this point she is absolutely correct, as her perspective on gender roles is utterly unrealistic.
On the rare occasions Jennifer Lopez strays from the love song formula, the results are just as counter-progressive. "Jenny From the Block" attempts to present her image as down to earth and insists she hasn't lost her street credibility. As much as Lopez would like to pretend it is otherwise, social status and wealth are inextricably linked in capitalist society. She sings, "Don't be fooled by the rocks that I got, I'm still Jenny from the block," as if one could go from being lumpenproletariat to fabulously wealthy without any change of class consciousness. Whether she likes it or not, she benefits from the exploitation of others. The lifestyle she leads, i.e. the rocks that she's got, is only possible through the slavery of imperialism. "Make the money, get the mansion, bring the homies with us" may assuage her settler guilt, but it only reinforces the depressed economic conditions of the ghetto she claims to represent, to say nothing of the country-sized ghettoes Amerikan hegemony creates.
Jennifer Lopez, and her numerous counterparts in movies and music that share her contradictory values of love of wealth and romanticization of poverty, do nothing for the betterment of the internal semi-colonies they wish to represent. Their aspirations for massive amounts of wealth and celebration of decadence, only perpetuate the miserable existence of oppressed peoples everywhere.
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