Whatever You Say I Am_ The Life and Times of Eminem - Anthony Bozza [110]
Kim Mathers
IN THE ALPHABETIC “DIRECTORY” of Eminem’s lyrical issues, under “W,” after weed and white, the rest of the book is filled with entries on women. At the center of Eminem’s lyrical drama are some of the more cinematic misogynistic fantasies ever plucked from the depths of the male psyche, yet today he is admired as an artist, sex symbol, or both, by women of all ages. It was just a few years ago that Eminem was a cause for protest by the National Organization for Women, and his onstage routine included battering an inflatable sex doll that represented his wife while arenas full of fans chanted “Kill Kim.” In 2002, middle-aged women such as Maureen Dowd of the New York Times, who are of the feminist generation, were as titillated by Eminem’s new macho paradigm as pubescent girls at an *NSYNC concert. Perhaps Eminem’s elevation to icon by the mainstream epitomizes the mood of both sexes in millennial America. Real-life issues such as employment and independence have replaced more politicized goals, while antifeminist attitudes are tolerated because unbridled maleness is celebrated. But there is more to Eminem’s significance than his having achieved the magic media formula: He is both the man whom men respect and whom women want. As a thirty-something-year-old product of a single-parent home, where his mother was supreme ruler, he resonates deeper as the product of this ongoing blight. The forthcoming chronicle of his life in his lyrics, in addition to the lawsuits between them, leaves little doubt that Eminem and his mother have a difficult relationship, one that has been echoed in Eminem’s marriage; and one that, in the examination of his music, illuminates the roots of a common pathology.
LEFT: A tale of two Marshalls: Marshall Mathers II holding Marshall Mathers III during the two years he was in Eminem’s life (1972).
RIGHT: I never meant to hurt you: Debbie Mathers holding her infant son, Marshall (1972).
Eminem’s attitude toward women in his canon is split between focused anger at specific women and unfocused disdain and distrust for women he doesn’t know. Eminem’s more general antifemale sentiments, regardless of their degree of truth, are standard in hardcore rap and are reflective of today’s harshest popular music. Male mistrust of women or gleeful objectification of women is an age-old theme in music, and all art for that matter, from bluesmen done wrong by their lovers and country crooners driving lonely back roads, pining for the one that got away, to the Rolling Stones’ dissection of the pros and cons of their female admirers in 1978’s “Some Girls.” Both Jay-Z and Mötley Crüe offered similar dissertations, both in songs called “Girls, Girls, Girls.” American culture is in a state in which objectification of women is an accepted aesthetic. The feminist-identity politics of the late eighties and early nineties that drove the issues of date rape and sexual harassment into the national dialogue are gone. But the antifeminist attitudes popular today are not new, either. In the 1980s, as the efforts of politicized feminists of the 1970s began to pay off, women enjoyed more power in the workforce than ever before, and pop stars such as Madonna and Cyndi Lauper embodied a young, vibrant, sexy brand of self-aware woman. But by the second half of the decade, a popular male-driven backlash began to color pop culture.
“The angry white male became a sort of emblem of a new Republican party that integrated sexual issues into their politics in the eighties which really helped them a lot,” says Richard Goldstein, executive editor of the Village Voice, and political and cultural critic since 1966. “All of these pop-cultural changes are very related to political issues. At the same time that the angry white male arose as an icon in politics, it arose in heavy metal, hip-hop, and comedy, too. It was a backlash against feminism and a male paranoia that was an issue in culture at the time. Sam Kinison and Andrew Dice Clay spewed the most violent misogyny on televison, Saturday Night Live was another bastion of