Spring Fling headliner MGMT performed at Brown this weekend, but the band wasn’t alone — Snoop Dogg, Major Lazer, the Black Keys and Wale (who performed at last year’s Spring Fling) also played at Brown’s “Spring Weekend.” And just as some Yalies are upset about the Spring Fling committee’s choice of the Ying Yang Twins, because of the group’s allegedly misogynistic songs, some Brown students are upset that their peers have been apathetic about Snoop Dogg’s provocative lyrics.
In a letter to the editor of the Brown Daily Herald last week, two students wrote that their peers’ “unchecked enthusiasm” for the rapper’s music counters Brown’s reputation as a liberal campus.
From the letter:
Snoop Dogg’s lyrics go beyond objectifying women to the point of attacking women’s rights. In his 2004 song “Can U Control Yo’ Hoe,” the lyrics speak for themselves:
“You got a b—- that won’t do what you say…/ She hardheaded, she just won’t obey/ You’ve got to put that b—- in her place/ Even if it’s slapping her in her face.”
Given Brown’s reputation as a liberal campus, we are shocked that tickets for such a blatantly misogynistic artist would sell out within an hour of their release and without a word of commentary. Whether it reflects apathy toward or ignorance of Snoop Dogg’s lyrics, we find the student body’s lack of deliberation disturbing.