Feminism/racism in the Lily Allen comeback video "Hard Out Here."

I don't care about this kind of music and dance, and I've never paid any attention to this lady who — I see — went away and has come back, but I've been interested in the ins and outs of the discourse of feminism since before Ms. was a magazine. And I've been observing American racial politics at least since I was 10 years old, when Life magazine featured photographs like these. Everyone read Life, but not every 10 year old had, set out next to Life on the family coffee table, the latest issue of Playboy.

So indulge me while I take a look at the race trouble that's befallen Ms. Allen and inquire into soundness of her "I'm protesting the objectification of women" story. Here's the video that went up 2 days ago and has over 2 million views.

(I have no idea whether that viewership represents actual hunger for more from an artist who'd been away for a while or virality over this race-and-sex controversy to which I'm contributing.)

The video begins with the singer submitting to the violent intrusions of the liposuction wand while a mean old white businessman type guy harangues her about her body. The lyrics bitch about all the pressure to "lose some weight 'cause we can't see your bones" and "fix your face or you'll end up on your own/Don't you want to have somebody who objectifies you?" The chorus is "It's hard out here for a bitch/It's hard, for a bitch."

So, you see, it's pretty basic, mainstream, contemporary, young-person feminism: complaining about the way other people make her obsess about her body all the time. Of course, she proceeds to show off her body and the bodies of many other females, dancing in the manner that she's supposedly so outraged about those terrible other people causing to happen. Let's leave to the side the hypocrisy and lameness of feminism like that, because Allen's in trouble about race.

Here's Ayesha A. Siddiqi writing in Vice.

In full-sleeved dresses Allen mocks her inability to twerk amidst women of color in body suits who launch into exaggerated dance moves, licking their hands and then rubbing their crotch. Her older white male manager tries to get to her to mimic them. Meanwhile she sings, “Don’t need to shake my ass for you/‘Cause I’ve got a brain.”....

It is not feminist to mock talented dancers of color for exercising skills Allen doesn’t possess. It is not feminist to claim that women who cook and dance provocatively are as damaging as a manager barking at her to lose weight. It is not feminist to remain blissfully colorblind in a world that functions along race.

As long as white womens’ empowerment requires lowering everyone else their “feminism” is just rebranded white supremacy.