Samo "rapped" up in BlueFace battle

Before this article gets written off as another vapid feminist screaming into the cosmos via political facebook posts about “The Man” or telling politicians to “get out of their womb,” I want to make clear that that is not my aim. I know that not all rap music is sexist. Rap, like many art forms, has several genres that stem from it. It is not just one sound, topic or narrative. It is a spectrum. And while I understand that art is typically expressed metaphorically and it’s message isn’t literal, I don’t think that there is much room for interpretation when it is the same, 12, perverted lyrics being repeated in various orders. The music put out by artist “BlueFace” is sexist. It revolves around the objectification of women and encourages promiscuity; these are not messages that our school should not be promoting, much less paying for. For those of you who don’t know, on Tuesday, Oct. 2, gang-affiliated underground soundcloud rapper “BlueFace” posted on his instagram account (@bluefacebleedem) about his potential interest in coming to a Southern California High School for an impromptu performance in the pursuit of “viral footage”. This post quickly became the venue of a schoolwide cyber-bloodbath between Samo and Pasadena High School. Amongst sparse outlying comments from students of other schools, Samo and Pasadena students dominated the comments section. For hours, students were commenting forth everything from votes for schools, to racial and socioeconomic insults. The comments for this post soon reached above 23,000, so BlueFace posted an Instagram poll on his story between the two schools, saying that he would perform at whichever school had the most votes by 12 a.m.. Throughout the day on Oct. 3, news of this battle spread across Samo and escalated to a point where Samo ASB posted on their official instagram account encouraging students to vote. Come 12 a.m., votes for both schools had reached over 14,000, and in the end, Samo lost 49 percent to 51 percent by a couple hundred. Hence, BlueFace announced he would be going to Pasadena that Friday. The next day, Samo students were clouded with anger from losing until du 6th period,  when an announcement was made that the following day students could pay a dollar to attend a “special performance” in the Greek at lunch. Most students understood that this special performance would be a BlueFace appearance. In the end, due to backlash from parents and a multitude of teachers, Samo administration cancelled the performance after seeing the potential danger of the situation.Which brings us up to speed. I don’t understand why the concept of letting a renowned gang-member onto campus, much asking students to pay him and implying school support of his affiliation, was ever even up for discussion. Amidst all the chaos of Oct. 3, I went to BlueFace’s youtube channel to hear what my fellow students were actually voting for. I had never before heard of him and so I was interested in seeing what all the hype was about. What I found was repetitive hooks and iMovie editing. I understand that lyrics are not always meant to be interpreted literally and that sometimes songs use graphic lyricism for the culture, but there is nothing artistic or metaphorical about a video featuring seven girls twerking on guys who are rapping about their asses and placing singles under their thongs all filmed on an iPhone 5c. It isn’t artistic. There is no deeper meaning. It’s a lap dance to music.BlueFace’s content is legitimately the poster child for every rap video stereotype. His lyrics are demeaning to women, his videos predominantly consist of female objectification and his social media is borderline pornographic. The amount of posts on his Instagram about his music or club events are equal to that of posts dedicated to stripper’s areolas. This is not the image we want for Samo. This is not the message that we should be conveying as “goals” to our boys or as acceptable treatment to our girls. Ultimately, Samo administration made the responsible decision to cancel the concert and our school is the better for it.