I’m still around good people.

About to post a ton of pics on my other Tumblr. (thatdamnboheme.tumblr.com)

Making some moves and staying busy. Hoping to force myself to write something soon.

Still love.

xoxoxo

Brian McKnight, to me, and probably the rest of us who lived and breathed in the 90s, holds a strange place in my adult memory. With an array of relatively predictable R&B hits and a crooning falsetto, Brian McKnight is securely a nice guy in my memory. (Let me know if I missed something.) Somehow firmly in the middle of the spectrum: beneath the blatant sexuality of an R.Kelly, but still above the cornball of a Lionel Ritchie. He was just Brian McKnight.

Thus, you can imagine my surprise this afternoon when my Twitter timeline featured people both up in arms and drowning in laughs over B. McKnight and a song containing references to a squirting pussy. Really? Firmly-in-the-R&B-middle Brian McKnight singing about a pussy?

For me, I am not offended as I am amused. I am always tickled by the presumptuousness of a man suggesting that he and he alone can somehow unlock the mysteries of femininity. The reason why this suggestion tickles me (no pun intended) is because it is usually pushed forth by men who couldn’t unlock a wide-open door. I’ve known men like this; so utterly clueless, but still boastful in the fact that they would somehow shake the earth underneath any and all women, almost always asserting that this earth-shattering event would occur through their sex. (These men usually always suck in bed.)

However, there are men out there who do know a little something about pussy, and who can most certainly show you some things that you may not know about yourself. (I’ve also known this kind of man.) This type of man is not into boastfully asserting that he and he alone can somehow unlock all the mysteries of femininity, but who will confidently and often quietly let you know that you won’t forget what he’ll do to you. (These type of men usually always have excellent sex.)

This all being said, I am in no way upset that Brian McKnight made a song talking about showing a woman what to do with her pussy. After listening to the song, it sounds like a jingle; it’s so upbeat and surprisingly non-sexual, despite the lyrics. I’m lead to believe that he was making the song as a joke, as I could swear I heard laughter towards the end of the track. Regardless, he’s a grown ass man, and I’m pretty sure he’s had sex. Do I think the lyrics are funny? Yes, in the sense that to me, McKnight has such a lack of swag (for lack of a better word) that I don’t feel he could show me what to do with my pussy if he had detailed instructions and a color-by-number. Brian McKnight has made such a name for himself as that safely-in-the-R&B-middle guy that hearing him assert something so blatantly—but not artfully—sexual is laughable.

What caused me just pause was some of the responses I saw regarding the lyrics and song. Women seem to be disappointed in McKnight because they feel as though he doesn’t have to “stoop to this level of vulgarity to get attention” and McKnight himself seemed in shock that people were so hateful about the lyrics when they let their kids listen to songs about “killing people and selling drugs and calling women bitches.”

Um, what?

First of all, the argument that “well-he-does-it-so-why-am-I-getting-in-trouble-when-I-do-it?” is so played (and so childish) that I don’t even want to waste time addressing it—the idiocy is apparent within the tweet itself. And secondly, I’m having an issue with all the hoopla today over the song’s “vulgarity.”

Not because the song isn’t vulgar. Oh yes, it is, but not for the reasons that seemed to have women up-in-arms. Yes, it’s vulgar in the sense that any song would be that’s written so poorly. The artistry of writing is always in the showing, rather than the telling. Additionally, the song isn’t aurally pleasing. The melody, nothing special; the juxtaposition with “let me show you how your pussy works,” jarring.

But what had women so upset, I wonder? Because he uses the word “pussy”? Because McKnight doesn’t seem like the type to use such lexicon? (I personally feel like he’d call a vagina a pocketbook before he called it a pussy.) It can’t honestly be because the song is that offensive; I can off-hand think of a couple of songs much more vulgar and much less laughable; ones that have actually gotten me hot in the pants and wet in the drawers. (Joe’s “What Your Man Won’t Do”, damn near anything from the 90s R.Kelly collection, and Prince’s “Insatiable” for starters.)

If you’re going to be offended, be offended because the simplistic lyrics are an affront to artistry, not because Brian McKnight wants to show you what he can do with your pussy. (If he can find it.)

Does anyone else lie in bed at 2:30am filled with the crippling fear that they’re never going to accomplish anything in life and fail miserably or is that just me?

Oh, that’s 2:30 am? Try 2:30 pm for me.

Been missing for a minute. Still here. Still processing; still growing.