A Closer Look At Rihanna's 'S&M' Video

I always remember the first time I hear Rhianna's song "Sand M"on the radio. I was appalled by the lyrics in the song. I immediately thought that the lyrics were going to encourage her fans to become increasingly sexualized. The chorus line says,"Sticks and stones may hurt me but chains and whips excite me." I have seen several clips of the music video but I was not able to find the video in its entirety. It was banned from youtube for indecent material. In the clips that I have seen she is in bondage struggling to get out. The scene is colorfully designed. In another scene a group of men in suits pin her to the wall. She is wearing a dress made of newspaper. The men put a piece of plastic over her and tape it down, as to suffocate her under it. In another portion she is in a short of white spandex bandage outfit and she is whipping some tied up people.
In an interview she stated that this song and video, however have nothing to do with the highly sexualized theme, title, and lyrics. The song, she seems to imply in this interview, is a form of rebellion. In a following video I found a clip of some MTV representative discussing the video and analyzing it. He seemed to be saying that the video was a sort of way for her to express the way media has "pinned her as the scapegoat." She seems to be saying that she wants to be "bad" but doesn't want to be punished and looked down upon by others for it. In the clip he mentions the video seems symbolic of her relationship with media. She is sometimes victimized and at other times she is the one calling the shots. She seems to be taking back her power in this way. He also mentions that many artist have had "this type" of rebellion in their careers. Madonna did it with her eroticism era and Britney spears has done this several times with the video circus, womanizer, and others.

It is completely ignorant to deny the impact that media has, had, and continues to have on us as a people. I am going back to the idea of Hegemony. Hegemony, from my last blog, mentions that our senses of self as a society come from a collection of ideas that are strategically placed in media, schools, central religions, government or public settings. These ideas are seeped and leaked into our beings by repetitive messages that are normalized as natural and acceptable. These ideas are at the expense of certain groups: races, genders, classes ect. so that another group benefits and continues to benefit. I am reminded of the idea that I heard once said about black people. Someone had once said that, "White people no longer need to suppress us as they once did in slavery. We as a people (black communities) do it to ourselves." In other words the speaker was saying that as a people (a community) has come so accustomed to being the "underdog" that they have internalized that and live into that repressed position: all the while believing it is natural and normal.
Knowing what we know about Hegemony, lets take another look at Rihanna's S and M video. If the video is really meant to send the message she claims (of rebellion and not of sexuality) then one must ask...
Why does she feel the need to "rebel" using her sexuality?
The irony here is that she again uses her sexuality to get her point across: that she is tired of being judged for being sexual. "Rebellion" implies that the person taking on this action is doing something different than whats "normal" or "acceptable." But in fact Rhianna is not "rebelling" at all but living into the role that media and society have given and developed for women. She is not be any "different" than anyone else in mainstream media: she has simply made it more "colorful." It would seem that the once "rebellious mold for women" is now everyday. Women are expected to be sexual objects for men: this is what media dictates for the role of women.

 These ideas are very vivid in pornography. According to the documentary we watched in class, typically any genre of porn contains 80 to 90% of violence and degradation. Of that percentage 94% of the violence is directed at women. These women are exploited as sexual objects for only the man's pleasure. They are not viewed or treated humanely and they do not receive any more respect than an animal. There is no question that porn is directed at a male audience. There is also no question that the goal of this degradation is to keep women in their place. 
Then media does its best to make the roles in porn look natural. Advertisements and media create images mirroring that of porn: images that defile the woman and her body. Often times the woman is depicted in sections: making only parts of her body seem valuable. Women are posed in ads as vulnerable, young, ready for sex and only there to be used as a sex object. Our "roles and identities" as women have been laid out very nicely before us, thanks to the use of porn and media.
Rhianna has done a fine job of incorporating porn into mainstream media. It was always there subtly and sometimes not so subtly. Yet now if we have any question to its existence, her song cleared that up.
I consider myself a pretty smart person but when I heard her song "S and M" I didn't hear any kind of "rebellion." I immediately felt how sexual the song was and felt there was a sexual message behind it.

...so lets think about this logically, how many people would actually understand that this video is "not  about sex?!" Rhianna must be misinformed herself if she truly believes the song has absolutely nothing to do with sex.

 

A Closer Look At Rihanna's 'S&M' Video: MTV News' James Montgomery breaks down Rihanna's new video.