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"The Boondocks" has been wildly uneven this season -- it seems to either completely miss, or else it lands square on the target, and not much in between. (And it does have quite a few actual targets this time around, as opposed to simply putting funny episodes out. Axes WILL be ground sharp this year.)
The story of Gangstalicious, part 2: "This is about ... thuggin' love..." (Flash required, language not remotely work safe)
We start with a Gangstalicious video called "Homies over Hoes". A dance called "Do the Homie", involving, apparently, throwing a woman halfway across a room, followed by dancing with your male homie, a dance which includes bashing your chest into your homie's chest. Because, you know, there's nothing homoerotic about all that exclusively male physical contact. Nothing at all. Nope.
What I want to know is, just how much of what actually went on in this episode sailed right over certain people's heads. There was, quite literally, not one single thing in that episode that even pretended to be subtle. For example, pointing out just how homoerotic having an all male posse can be, especially when your stock in trade is publicly and emphatically disrespecting and deliberately alienating women. One of the rappers specifically says that given the way they treat women, it's not like they ought to be hanging around or that they want them hanging around. (No, really, HE SAYS THAT.) The one thing that will be clearly understood by all, I suspect, is that McGruder seems to have, shall we say, a pronounced lack of respect for some rappers and the people who love their music. Gangstalicious, and what he has to do to keep his career, seems mostly sad and pathetic; the out gay former rappers, on the other hand, come off pretty well. The people who actually like the misogynist/homoerotic music Gangstalicious and the other rappers make and who don't see what's going on inside the lyrics -- you get the impression there's some active contempt going on there, personified by Riley who very slowly and painfully gets a clue, and then promptly rejects it because he just doesn't want to think that way. The encounter between Riley and Gangstalicious near the end is really desperately sad for both of them.
Mind, pointing out the connection between the prison/fashion complex and rap was kind of ... weird. I mean, yes, prison is "sort of gay" in the sense of being an all male environment in which many of them have sex with each other (whether they want to or not), and, yes, a lot of black men come into contact with prison, thanks to this country's peculiar justice system, but somehow, it really doesn't seem like repeated gang rape or "any port in a storm" should quite count as "sort of gay" in any meaningful way. Fashion, on the other hand ... Oh, dear god, THOSE CLOTHES! Gangstalicious has ... INteresting taste in the clothes he designed. Quite tasteful use of pink and lavender. (In fact, at least in terms of the gay side of the show, the clothes were the only things even remotely stereotypical.) I get the fact that they were pointing out, with all the subtlety of an anvil fusillade, that the only ones wearing all this gay-ass crap were straight men who were desperately clueless. But ... if Gangstalicious was clinging that desperately to his closet, as he had to do to keep his career, wouldn't he have been a bit more careful about the clothes he put his name on? Wouldn't one of his posse have said, "Man, all that pink, that looks kinda gay, don't you think?"
The "I love gay rappers" show, hosted by rappers who'd made it big until they tried to be really really REALLY out -- tried to be themselves -- and lost their careers, as counterpoint was also kind of perfect, especially the end. After all, what they said at the end is true: "Will hip-hop accept an outwardly gay rapper? I don't know. First, someone has to come out of the closet ... Peekaboo!"
The story of Gangstalicious, part 2: "This is about ... thuggin' love..." (Flash required, language not remotely work safe)
Tonight's episode disclaimer: The following is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual gay-ass rappers is coincidental. Seriously, we're not talking about anybody at all. The rapper you think we're talking about, we're not talking about him. In fact, as far as we know, no rapper in the history of rap music has ever kissed another man or fondled another man's goodies.
Dictated, not read.
The Management.
We start with a Gangstalicious video called "Homies over Hoes". A dance called "Do the Homie", involving, apparently, throwing a woman halfway across a room, followed by dancing with your male homie, a dance which includes bashing your chest into your homie's chest. Because, you know, there's nothing homoerotic about all that exclusively male physical contact. Nothing at all. Nope.
What I want to know is, just how much of what actually went on in this episode sailed right over certain people's heads. There was, quite literally, not one single thing in that episode that even pretended to be subtle. For example, pointing out just how homoerotic having an all male posse can be, especially when your stock in trade is publicly and emphatically disrespecting and deliberately alienating women. One of the rappers specifically says that given the way they treat women, it's not like they ought to be hanging around or that they want them hanging around. (No, really, HE SAYS THAT.) The one thing that will be clearly understood by all, I suspect, is that McGruder seems to have, shall we say, a pronounced lack of respect for some rappers and the people who love their music. Gangstalicious, and what he has to do to keep his career, seems mostly sad and pathetic; the out gay former rappers, on the other hand, come off pretty well. The people who actually like the misogynist/homoerotic music Gangstalicious and the other rappers make and who don't see what's going on inside the lyrics -- you get the impression there's some active contempt going on there, personified by Riley who very slowly and painfully gets a clue, and then promptly rejects it because he just doesn't want to think that way. The encounter between Riley and Gangstalicious near the end is really desperately sad for both of them.
Mind, pointing out the connection between the prison/fashion complex and rap was kind of ... weird. I mean, yes, prison is "sort of gay" in the sense of being an all male environment in which many of them have sex with each other (whether they want to or not), and, yes, a lot of black men come into contact with prison, thanks to this country's peculiar justice system, but somehow, it really doesn't seem like repeated gang rape or "any port in a storm" should quite count as "sort of gay" in any meaningful way. Fashion, on the other hand ... Oh, dear god, THOSE CLOTHES! Gangstalicious has ... INteresting taste in the clothes he designed. Quite tasteful use of pink and lavender. (In fact, at least in terms of the gay side of the show, the clothes were the only things even remotely stereotypical.) I get the fact that they were pointing out, with all the subtlety of an anvil fusillade, that the only ones wearing all this gay-ass crap were straight men who were desperately clueless. But ... if Gangstalicious was clinging that desperately to his closet, as he had to do to keep his career, wouldn't he have been a bit more careful about the clothes he put his name on? Wouldn't one of his posse have said, "Man, all that pink, that looks kinda gay, don't you think?"
The "I love gay rappers" show, hosted by rappers who'd made it big until they tried to be really really REALLY out -- tried to be themselves -- and lost their careers, as counterpoint was also kind of perfect, especially the end. After all, what they said at the end is true: "Will hip-hop accept an outwardly gay rapper? I don't know. First, someone has to come out of the closet ... Peekaboo!"
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I don't think any of it sailed over my head, but then again, I also don't know how typical I am of the show's audience.
Favorite moment: when Tom is explaining to Granddad that gay people tend to get arrested less frequently and have higher incomes than straight people, and Granddad starts to see the light: "You get all that with gay?"
From:
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On a related subject, I've always wondered where Huey and Riley's parents were. Did McGruder ever address that? Wikipedia (the source of all that is True in the universe) is silent on the topic.
From:
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Their parents seem to be dead. We never find out how or what happened. There's a reference in the first episode where Grampa says something about spending their inheritance. In the episode where Riley paints his parents' faces on the side of their house, it seems to be clear, in an unstated way, that the parents are dead, and that Riley and Tom somehow never really mourned them. But it's never explicitly stated.
I gather that gay viewers immediately got that the guys were a couple, whereas straight viewers (including me) didn't see that (not to become cliched, but I did assume they were "just" roommates).
OK, in all seriousness, anyone who can look at this commercial (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_s5-R_JE4c) and go "Omigawd they're so incredibly gay I can't believe it look how gay they are SQUEEEEE!" (or words to that effect) is just trying too damn hard. Yes, you can view it that way if you like, sure, but honestly, there's nothing in there to say anything more than that they're roommates or that they're not more.
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It's like that Leisha Hailey car commercial. If you don't watch The L Word, it just looks like they're marketing to women. If you do, you know they're marketing to lesbians. It works both ways.
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