madonna

You know what I totally appreciate? Being called out when I am stupid! An exciting incidence of this occurred recently, on my Madonna post, where commenter Crys T notes: 

OK, on this point, I get why you're happy to have Madonna around. But it would be nice to see more recognition on the part of Anglo-American feminists on Madonna's extensive history of cultural appropriation. It's not just that she now buys African children (though even I never thought she'd become that monstrous), it's a very long history of exploiting, offending and therefore harming people from cultures that don't have much of a voice in the English-speaking world.

Which is a darn solid point! In that post, I made reference to Madonna's history of cultural appropriation, and that it gave me "serious pause." And then I just kind of breezed on by it like it was no big thing! Because apparently that was the day that I decided to be gross and obviously privileged, SORRY. Madonna's appropriation of other cultures definitely deserves to be addressed and critiqued at length, in its own post. A post such as this one, right here!  

You know: a lot of people have problems with Madonna. In fact, pretty much the entire history of Madonna has been the history of people having various problems with her! I first learned of her existence when a news channel reported on one of her concerts. I was maybe five or six. It was her "crucifix as fashion accessory" phase; possibly, also, her "pretending to masturbate on stage" phase. And my mother turned to me and said, "you know, it's important to realize that not everyone likes her.

The forthcoming Kanye West and Lady Gaga tour/collaboration/alliance/bizarro-pop-Voltron makes sense for so many reasons. Primarily: Kanye and Gaga are both famous because they do weird things in public. Do you like their music? Do you not like their music? It doesn't matter! What did you think of the weird thing? Did you think it was weird? Because, if so, they have succeeded! And even I, an earnest unpacker of Meanings for lo these many blog posts now, have to admit that I enjoy Kanye and Gaga primarily because they make Meaning effectively useless.

Image via open.salon.com

The other day I was alone in the car and, as you do, singing at the top of my lungs with the radio. The song that was the focus of this particular private performance happened to be Lil' Wayne's "Lollipop" and as I belted out the lyrics, Middle of the bed/ Givin' gettin' head my thoughts turned to oral sex. More specifically, my thoughts turned to songs about oral sex. I wondered, "What songs are out there that give oral love a good name?"

Now, your first thought here might be, "Get your mind out of the gutter and focus on driving!" And your next thought might be, "Why should we care about songs that focus on oral sex?" To your first thought I say don't worry; I didn't take my eyes off the road once during my oral sex-y brainstorming session. And to your second thought I say, if we can agree that the mass media can affect public perceptions, then it stands to reason that songs that put oral sex in a positive light can affect public perceptions of the act in a positive way. (Read: The more songs that make oral sex seem fun and cool, the more oral sex we will all give/get, and the better we'll feel about it.) This is a good thing for all parties involved, but it is an especially big win for women. That's because the media often suggests that women can orgasm very easily from penetration alone, yet just about anyone who has had sex with/is a woman knows that it often takes a lot more than that.

So what are the best oral-sex-positive jams? Let's discuss after the jump!

Warning: The following post may be NSFW, depending on where you W.