“I blow a half 1,000,000 on you hoes, I’m a feminist,” Drake raps in a lyric that, like a lot of his current output, is perched between humor and model administration, shock and forgettability, engagement and apathy. The joke is, after all, that males who deal with girls as hoes aren’t feminist. However then once more, Her Loss—Drake’s new, joint album with the Atlanta rapper 21 Savage—is a queasy ode to femininity, from its title to its cowl artwork. On one track, Drake shouts out abortion rights. On one other, he says he’d vote for a feminine president (the porn star Teanna Trump). All through, in his typical method, he fixates on the ability girls maintain over him sexually—and the ability he can maintain over them financially.
How ironic that Her Loss, launched final Friday, has drawn consideration largely for Drake disrespecting a girl. On the brand new track “Circo Loco,” he raps this: “This bitch lie ’bout gettin’ pictures, however she nonetheless a stallion.” The road was extensively interpreted as dissing Megan Thee Stallion, the 27-year-old Houston emcee who accused one other rapper, Tory Lanez, of capturing her ft in 2020. Within the courtroom of public opinion and in an ongoing prison trial, Lanez has pleaded harmless, and the “Circo Loco” line would appear to sign Drake’s settlement that Megan is being dishonest. Shortly after the album dropped, she tweeted her anger, writing, “Cease utilizing my capturing for clout.” Hip-hop now has a brand new beef, and it hints on the market worth of misogyny.
Megan Thee Stallion’s capturing has been handled as a spectacle from the beginning. In August 2020, she stated that, a month earlier, Lanez had fired at her after she’d gotten out of a automobile through which she, Lanez, and two others had been arguing. Since then, the general public has seen medical information documenting bullet fragments in her ft, a text-message apology from Lanez to Megan (for an unspecified offense) despatched shortly after the alleged assault, and a textual content from a good friend who was within the automobile, telling a bodyguard that “Tory shot Meg.” In track lyrics and on social media, Lanez has disputed Megan’s account, although with out clearly offering his personal model of occasions. Prosecutors have charged him with capturing her, and the courtroom case is ongoing.
Proving guilt or innocence is difficult, however opinions across the case have develop into bizarrely polarized. To Megan and her supporters, the capturing demonstrates the disrespect and hazard Black girls routinely face. Lanez’s defenders suspect that Megan has spun a hoax, although should you browse their on-line commentary, you don’t discover a clear and unanimous foundation for that suspicion. Some skeptics elevate pseudo-rational disputes together with her timeline (Megan recovered from her accidents shortly—too shortly?). Others flow into debunked information (Lanez has amplified misinformation, violating a decide’s order about discussing the case). Rappers together with 50 Cent and Boosie BadAzz have fixated on Megan’s denial of a sexual relationship with Lanez, as if it’s apparent that they did sleep collectively, as if it will matter if that they had, as if the case is understandable provided that it fulfills stereotypes about feminine jealousy and vindictiveness.
What’s clear is that having a robust opinion in opposition to Megan is, in lots of circumstances, extra of a tribal place than a logical one, with gendered overtones. And Drake’s “Circo Loco” lyric aligns him with one camp—although vaguely sufficient to provide him some cowl from blowback. Previously few days, his listeners have sown doubt about what he’s actually saying. Lil Yachty, a collaborator on among the album, has stated the road is “not about Megan,” however slightly about beauty injections. One other take says that Drake was referring to a mannequin referred to as Elke the Stallion. Such interpretations aren’t defenses, although. Lyrics can have layered meanings, however it’s laughable to say that Drake, who’s as calculating as a pc, didn’t intend for the phrases pictures, lie, and stallion to set off precisely this type of controversy.
Controversy, in spite of everything, may be worthwhile. Greater than ever, the music-media ecosystem is pushed by gossip and feuds, which savvy figures comparable to Drake manipulate with lyrical barbs that double as search engine optimisation key phrases. On Her Loss, he refers to Serena Williams’s husband, Alexis Ohanian, as a “groupie” for the tennis star. The rapper additionally appears to precise ambivalence about having made peace final 12 months with Ye, a mentor turned rival. And he sneers at DRAM, a rapper he beefed with seven years in the past. None of those insults articulates a lot—not an agenda, not a worldview—apart from a want for consideration. And certain sufficient, publicity about these disses has far eclipsed protection of Her Loss’s precise (and fairly good!) music. “Circo Loco” even debuted at No. 1 on Billboard’s Scorching Trending Songs chart.
The swipe at Megan is very nasty, although, as a result of though it may be good for Drake’s enterprise, it comes at a value for others. Not solely has Drake compelled Megan to defend herself, her profession, and her credibility as soon as once more. However at a second of mounting #MeToo backlash, he has additionally fed into the sense that reflexively dismissing the tales of ladies—and on this case, Black girls—is edgy and smart. And the truth that a market exists for this type of inconsiderate commodification of another person’s wrestle simply proves the darkish level that Megan has been making all alongside. “I’ve realized that violence in opposition to girls just isn’t all the time linked to being in a relationship,” she wrote in The New York Occasions in 2020. “As a substitute, it occurs as a result of too many males deal with all girls as objects.”
