[ SECRET POST #1680 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #1680 ⌋


Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 05 pages, 102 secrets from Secret Submission Post #240.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 1 - too big ], [ 0 - hit/ship/spiration ], [ 0 - omgiknowthem ], [ 0 - take it to comments ], [ 0 - repeats ]
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments and concerns should go here.

Comments

[alliterations.livejournal.com]

I'd be with you if this secret was more "man, I get irrationally disappointed when this happens because that song was so perfect, and I can't bring myself to ignore the gendered pronouns," because I get irrationally disappointed at that too sometimes.

But where you lost me was when you started talking about how the songs should be "neutral" and that the singers were worried that the songs might sound "gay." It's...well, it's what the writer/singer decided to do, and while it's fine to be a little irritated when it otherwise would have fit your OTP, music is expression.

[(Anonymous)]

This. This is some entitlement here, and makes me wonder if the OP knows anything about songwriting.

[beandelphiki.livejournal.com]

So WHAT if "music is expression"? OP is right, the sudden addition of a gendered pronoun is frequently jarring, rarely completes a rhyme, and is just generally fucking pointless most of the time. Very often these days, it sounds almost as though it WAS added just to make the point that the song is sung from a heterosexual perspective, and it destroys any universality of the song.

There are some songs for which gendered pronouns are natural and organic. They are not common. And please note that many of the most universally appealing and timeless songs do not have gendered pronouns in them, or have pronouns that can be easily switched ("Some Enchanted Evening" comes to mind).

Every time I'm getting into a song and this happens, I rage. I HATE it. The artist CAN do whatever they damn well please, but that doesn't mean I have to respect the enforced heterosexism.

Songs are "expression." They are also generally written for an audience.

Were I a songwriter these days, I'd make it a point to avoid this shit. Sadly, I'm not. Reason #56789 not to listen to the radio...

[alliterations.livejournal.com]

the sudden addition of a gendered pronoun is frequently jarring, rarely completes a rhyme, and is just generally fucking pointless most of the time.

TO YOU. This is all opinion, here, but the problem lies in acting like you know better than the songwriter. If you don't like the use of gendered pronouns, that's fine and dandy, but don't act like the songwriters should change it because it makes you butthurt and sad inside.

Do I think there should be more good examples of LGBT individuals in all media? Sure I do, but that doesn't mean we rail against the songwriters who were simply writing about their own experiences. Some are genuinely trying to get across a message they believe in, and by no means should we knock them because they really wanted to put "she" or "he" in there.

You don't have to like it, but dear God, don't act like people who do use gendered pronouns are personally hurting you and should turn everything neutral. Oh, and by the way? Please note there are plenty of universally appealing and timeless songs that do have gendered pronouns in them.

[beandelphiki.livejournal.com]

Fail so hard. Did you seriously think this was just about asking for gayed-up songs?

A gay-focused song wouldn't be great either; unless the song was about an experience specific to queer people, it would be pointless to put pronouns in a love song by a queer artist as well. You could argue it as a representational thing, but that's about it.

[alliterations.livejournal.com]

Fail so hard, not addressing any of my other points about your entitled attitude!

And you used the word "heterosexism" which I assumed meant you were also angry about the "boy singing to girl" or "girl singing to boy" issue some other people have raised. So. I don't think that word means what you think it does.

[beandelphiki.livejournal.com]

"Entitled"? I don't think that word means what YOU think it means.

Heterosexism is relevant here because gendered pronouns USUALLY put the song in a heterosexual context AND destroy the universality of the song. Doesn't mean I'd welcome the reverse.


And it occurs to me that if we were discussing books or movies, people would NEVER be defending this shit as "personal expression," wtf.

[alliterations.livejournal.com]

Honey, you're implying that songwriters should make all their songs gender neutral because you think it's better that way. If that's not entitled, I don't know what is.

But if you'd be pissed off by any use of pronouns, why bring up that word at all?

No, books and movies are personal expression. But in discussing those, people often come off as "I disliked this certain thing, and I think it could have been done better because of X reason" rather than "I disliked this certain thing and I think I know better than the author/movie producer/whoever and they should change it because I say so."
Not to say people don't do the latter when discussing books and movies, and it is just as entitled as what you're saying.

[beandelphiki.livejournal.com]

But if you'd be pissed off by any use of pronouns, why bring up that word at all?

I explained that. Pretty clearly, I think.

Protesting the thoughtless reinforcement of a hegemonic paradigm (not that this was even the entire thrust of my concern, as I already explained) is not entitled and never could be. If people complained because ALL the main and important characters in a book or movie were male, or white, or whatever, for absolutely no good reason, no, that would not be "entitled" EITHER. It would be perfectly reasonable.

[alliterations.livejournal.com]

My point is completely going over your head, isn't it?

My problem is not with people finding problems within any kind of media. Hell, I do it all the time. My problem is with people thinking that the author/songwriter/whoever should change it because they happen to not like it. What you are talking about, concerning the male white characters, is a valid point within the context of sexism and the lack of non-white characters in media. Saying "I don't like this main, male character, because he is a bad stereotype of sexist male patriarchy" is different than saying "I don't like this main, male character, the author should have made the character female because I think that would be better."

The latter is entitled, and the latter is exactly what you're doing with gendered pronouns.

[(Anonymous)]

And it occurs to me that if we were discussing books or movies, people would NEVER be defending this shit as "personal expression," wtf.

Neither would anyone say that authors should use genderless pronouns in order to appeal to the most amount of people, so there you go.

[beandelphiki.livejournal.com]

Uh, but most characters aren't genderless. It would be virtually impossible to tell a story without indicating the character's gender (most of the time).

It's not only not impossible to do that in a song, it's fucking EASY.

[insanenoodlyguy.livejournal.com]

Easy? Sure. But not necessarily what the artists decide to write. Which is all that matters. Your inclusive/buisness philosophy isn't all that proven, plenty of gender-specific pronoun using songs have done quite well.

[xenafox.livejournal.com]

Completely agree with this comment. It is jarring as hell, especially when you get as far into daydreaming along with a song as I do @_@

[(Anonymous)]

Or your projecting, and the artist didn't add in anything but always intended for the song to be that way.

[hikari87.livejournal.com]

This might come as an appalling, startling surprise to you, but a lot of songwriters happen to be het, and guess what, when they write songs about falling in love, they generally tend to write about falling in love with a person of the opposite gender because that's who they themselves fell in love with. A LOT of love songs out there are/were inspired by ACTUAL LOVE AFFAIRS AND RELATIONSHIPS, which, if the writer of the song is straight, means that, guess what, the other person they're singing about IS OF THE OPPOSITE GENDER. You seem to feel that they shouldn't be allowed to mention the other person's gender solely because YOU don't want to hear about straight love affairs, which, guess what, is something you are either going to have to get over or simply, as you said, stop listening to pop music, because pretty sure all straight singers and songwriters are not going to stop mentioning IN PASSING the gender of their SO just because OMG HETEROSEXISM which, actually, that's NOT WHAT THE WORD MEANS YO.

[beandelphiki.livejournal.com]

WHEEEE I DIDN'T READ THE THREAD WHEEEEEE.

[(Anonymous)]

....Congratulations. You've just made a complete and utter ass of yourself.

[beandelphiki.livejournal.com]

...Oh, yes. And your argument doesn't even BEGIN to apply to covers and such that add gendered language that was never in the original.

[hikari87.livejournal.com]

I read the whole damn thread, actually. I didn't see you posting anything which would refute anything I said here. Try doing that, if you're capable, and maybe I'll stop facepalming at your laughable "debate" skills.

[beandelphiki.livejournal.com]

This, coming from someone with a repeatedly demonstrated inability to follow a fucking conversation in this community = LULZ 4EVA. It's like watching someone passionately argue with a couch for an hour and declare themselves the winner.

I'm not too concerned, basically.

[hikari87.livejournal.com]

I'm gonna go ahead and interpret that as "I can't defend my whiny entitlement complex, or give a valid reason why I think no one should be allowed to indicate what gender the person they're singing to happens to be, so I'm just gonna make a pathetic attempt at a personal attack in hopes that you'll be distracted enough not to notice."

[beandelphiki.livejournal.com]

Another person who doesn't know what "entitlement" means in this context!

I think the cushion on the left might be warming to your arguments. Keep at it.

[snowtroublehere.livejournal.com]

i agree, straight people should stop writing songs about their experiences and start removing all elements of expression and personal touch just to please you

please don't ever stop being so stupid it's amusing forever

[beandelphiki.livejournal.com]

a) Not what I said. There is like, a whole thread up there with me explaining repeatedly that this is not what I said.

b) ...Stupider then posting multiple versions of the same comment just to add one more OMG SO WITTY line?