An Unconscious Loss of Power

After discussing the topic of race, particularly African American women, I began to think about how Hooks made the claim that women in the entertainment industry have taken their bodies and sexuality and used them for power, but at the same time sexual "savagery." One area that comes to mind when I hear that idea is that of rap and hip-hop music videos. In those videos, women dance around sometimes half-naked, being degraded by the men who are indirectly rapping about them while essentially degrading themselves. This idea brings me back to the subject of the Hottentot Venus, as many people in society look at these music videos as a kind of spectacle in the media, amused yet shocked that a person's body is being portrayed as having such little worth. Also, while some performers use body parts such as the butt as a sign of taking something that was once negative and making it powerful, video vixens ultimately give their power back to the same people who had it in the past. Of course these girls may seem that they are independent and expressing their bodies in a way they want, but ultimately their bodies are once again looked at with no respect and are essentially made into commodities - something that can be purchased - just as black women's bodies were looked upon by their white counterparts in the past. Ultimately, changes need to be made and a message needs to be sent to the world of rap and hip-hop; they're messages aren't eradicating old ways of thinking - they continue to fuel them.