Lil Wayne

Here's the latest of what we're reading up on.

• Advertising in men's magazines try to convince dudes what really "makes a man."  And who are the targets of these ads? Most often, it's young, low-income men. [XX Factor]
• Misogyny and violence are unfortunately all too common in the lyrics of rap and hip hop.  Lil Wayne's latest song, though, compares having sex with the beating of Emmett Till. *Trigger Warning.*  [Crunk Feminist Collective]
• Although minister of women's affairs, Sihem Badi, admits things should've happened much sooner, Tunisia has opened their very first domestic violence shelter. [Ms. Magazine]
• At 58, Venezuela's president, Hugo Chávez, has died. [BBC]
• Teenage and pregnant? Well "shame on you" says the politicians behind New York City's latest advertising campaigns to discourage teen pregnancy rates. Nevermind that those rates have seen a drop of over 25 percent over the past decade. [RH Reality Check]
• While the notion of poverty in the U.S. is nothing new, here's a video, with commentary by Feministing, on the current rates of poverty in the country. [Feministing]
• Here are a few graphs on the discrepancies between the rates of published male and female authors, as well as reviewers. As if we needed another reminder as to how real the gender gap still is... [VIDA]
• The good folks over at Racialicious tackle the White straight privilege of rapper Macklemore of "Thrift Shop" fame. [Raciailicious]
• Although National Eating Disorder Awareness Week came to an end a few days ago, that doesn't mean we should stop our efforts to bring awareness to the issue.  Here's a raw and eye-opening video about the realities of living with an eating disorder. (For more info or support, visit NEDA.) [YouTube]

Did we miss something? Let us know in the comments!

I’ve already written about the amazing force that is Nicki Minaj when we mused on why Edna St. Vincent Millay might have loved Minaj’s “Starships.” But my favorite currently-charting lady rapper is in the news this week for a different reason and I thought it might result in another interesting RetroPoppy mashup, so oblige me as we return to the delightful Land of Minaj.

Today I focus on Nicki Minaj, a female rapper who is part of Lil Wayne's Young Money crew and has recently gone solo She's been on my radar for some time. Jonah Weiner recently wrote a Slate column about her. Jay Smooth and Maura Johnston had in an interesting exchange about her for NPR. Apparently this Web site gets several searches for her as well, so she's clearly someone we should be talking about.