Yes, I've stolen the title of a
Billy Bragg track for my heading here. Any excuse to mention Billy Bragg! I haven't been to a Bragg gig since 2009 (the last time he was in Toronto) and find myself very much in withdrawal lately. So before I really get started pull up a chair and enjoy some Billy Bragg philosophy & music with me:
Young Bill on The Tube singing A New England in 1983
Waiting for the Great Leap Forwards with 2011 Lyrics
Interview and music clips from the Rapido show in the early 90s (sadly his comment on "the failure of capitalism to deliver the fruits of society to the majority of people" is ever more relevant)
Three of the greats—
Michael Stipe, Natalie Merchant & Billy Bragg—
perform
Hello in There by American country/folk singer-songwriter John Prine back in 1990
Valentine's Day is Over
You'll notice, if the song
Valentine's Day is Over is new to you, that Billy's singing it from the point of view of a survivor of domestic violence.
If you want to talk about it well you know where the phone is/
Don't come round reminding me again how brittle bone is
Thank you for the things you bought me thank you for the card/
Thank you for the things you taught me when you hit me hard/
That love between two people must be based on understanding/
Until that's true you'll find your things/
All stacked out on the landing, surprise, surprise
Clearly this is not a love song in the traditional sense, although it is very much a song about self-worth. I have to wonder if the girls and women who were tweeting things along the lines of
I'd let Chris Brown beat me any day in the run-up to the Grammy's would get that or if domestic violence is just a joke to them? Because I remember those pictures of Rihanna after Chris Brown punched her in the face and to me there's nothing funny about that, or about being willing to swallow toxic cultural messages that say if you're powerful and rich enough (not to mention male) you can treat women however you want and still get invited to play at the Grammy's.
A brief reminder, in the form of a police statement, of the abuse Chris Brown committed against Rihanna:
This is what you're saying you're cool with, girls. And what the Grammy's is saying they're cool with.
Of course there were also people who were extremely upset about Chris Brown being invited to perform at the Grammy's:
* "It is absolutely unacceptable that someone who is known to have perpetuated violence against a woman has been so uncritically welcomed and promoted by the music industry."
—Country Star Miranda Lambert
* “We – the grown-up influencers in this country, the people with platforms and with educations and with power – are allowing a clear message to be sent to women: We will easily forgive a person who victimises you. We are able to look beyond the fact that you were treated as less than human, that a bigger, stronger person decided to resolve a conflict with you through violence. We know it happened, but it’s just not that big of a deal to us”.
—
Sasha Pasulka, 'I'm not okay with Chris Brown performing at the Grammys and I'm not sure why you are'
* "All along, the business, Brown himself and just about every celebrity who's had anything to say about Rihanna and Chris Brown have treated the assault as a private domestic matter - or even, most creepily, as just one dark element of a star-crossed romance. The outright condemnations have been few. When it comes to partner assault - and when it comes to attitudes about women in general - big parts of the music industry seems to lag the rest of North American society by at least a half a century."
—
Vancouver Sun
However, seemingly there were not
enough irate people to convince the Grammy's Chris Brown had no place on their stage. I didn't watch the awards but I understand he was "
welcomed with wild applause and a standing ovation."
I thank the people who publicly voiced their opposition to Chris Brown playing at the Grammy's, but if we want to reach a pointed where something like this doesn't happen again, and where our culture quits producing young women who say they're willing to be punched bloody by a celebrity, and where one in four women isn't physically abused in her lifetime, those of us—both male and female—who see domestic violence for the evil that it is and not something to be joked about or ignored, need to make a hell of a lot more noise. Speak up for your daughters, your friends, your sister, yourself. Valentine's Day is over.
