I’m not interested at all in going after Kanye West for the sake of it. That would be very boring. It specifically relates to the carnival of carnage he has created, the ‘rape scenario set to a soundtrack’, the idea that torture porn is sexy. We are targeting what he has created and the message it sends and the harm this causes – MTR
Sarah Parker at Change.org has blogged again with an update on our petition against Kanye West’s Monster video. She asks why Kanye West or his management have not responded given the level of concern globally.
Care2 and 
Change.org are both hosting our petitions which have so far secured a combined signature count of more than 8000. We’ve passed our original goal of 5000 so have now revised the target to 10,000.
Sarah writes:
When did promoting violence against women become an acceptable form of art? Hundreds of years ago, actually. But the question is, does that make it okay today? Over 7,000 activists all over the world say “no” and have put their collective foot down over Kanye West’s music video, “Monster.”
I recently reported on a petition started by Melinda Tankard Reist and Sharon Haywood that asks Universal Music Group, distributor of the video, to stop it’s official release, MTV to declare it will not promote the video, and Kanye to officially apologize for eroticizing violence against women. If you haven’t seen the leaked clips, the video contains beautiful, lingerie-clad women, possibly zombies or vampires, now dead. Kanye, Jay Z, and Rick Ross kill them and enjoy the spoils of victory – kissing the dead bodies, hanging practically naked bodies from the neck by chains, and eating a plate of raw meat between the legs of another scantily clad dead girl, to name a few. Nikki Minaj gets in on the act as a fanged dominatrix “interrogating” her pink-haired alter-ego, also played by Minaj. Read more>>
Kan-ye be a fan of dead women?
Great wordplay by Gender Agenda on the twitter campaign against Kanye West’s Monster. Great to have Gender Agenda’s support for our campaign.
Have you heard the latest word played on the street?
It’s been making gradual pace but looks set to make haste.
A kind of twitter revolution has been building its momentum.
Kan-ye be a fan of dead women?
It appears Kanye West can.
Kanye West, seems to have Swift-ly moved on from the Taylor-saga to the next level of drama in his new ‘Monster’ Vid. Facebook status updates have begun to take up the cause. As a social networker, have you voiced your objection in between your updates of being hung over and sleeping outdoors?
There’s a vulture in our popular culture that feeds on the ritual humiliation and exploitation of the female population. ‘Freedom of expression’ is the cry of opposition that would seek to hypocritically enforce oppression in the name of libertion.
But Kanye’s new video steps over the vultures line by perpetrating the lyrical crime of ‘rape and pillage a village’ in graphic detail on the unresponsive females in his pimp-flick
So let’s talk about the ideologies we spin to the masses through the music franchises. Rape and exploitation is a sexist expression of the mass oppression that flows from TV screens to our streets, from police stations to limited-rape-justice for the female nation. Only a monster would find arousal from sights of women being incapacitated to their eyeballs. Monsters should never become mainstream.
Will you make a contribution to the Twitter revolution? First things first, join the word on the street and sign the petition that denounces ‘Kan-ye for being a fan of raping dead women’. Spread the word, so that your message is heard loud and clear by Universal Music Group and MTV before they release ‘the Monster.’
7 Responses
Positively cringing at this article, Melinda.
The guilting at the social network status updates. The Swift/Kan-Ye Puns. Carnival of carnage? 8000 signatures is not attention “globally”. The link is broken so I couldn’t read what she had to say about Nicki.
I never gave the clip or the song any attention until the massive onslaught of tweets you’ve made regarding it.
Thanks Talia.Link is fixed. I really only have two choices: to object publicly or say nothing. The latter is not an option I can take.
Hi Talia,
The Kan-ye pun is perhaps a little on the dad joke side, but is it really fair to take a shot at Melinda for quoting someone else’s wordplay? ‘Carnival of carnage’, well maybe, but it does sum up the fun-in-the-slaughterhouse vibe of the Monster clip pretty effectively, no? 🙂
I’m a bit unsure as to what else there is to cringe about, though.
I’ve found the social networking updates promoting this cause to be awareness-raising, rather than ‘guilting’ – did you have any examples in mind?
As for the petition, I would think it’s s pretty ‘global’ by most standards – started by MTR in Australia and Sharon Haywood in Argentina, supported by organisations based around the world, with signatures collected internationally. 8000 signatures might not sound like much, but if you check out the change.org site you will see that victories have been claimed for issues with just a couple of hundred signatures.
I think I hear what you’re saying about maybe not noticing the clip if it hadn’t been drawn to your attention – but is having your attention drawn to it necessarily a bad thing? I’d also be interested to hear how you think Melinda could have gone about challenging this clip, other than publicly, and what power such a challenge could possibly have had…
Nicole
I wasn’t having a “shot” at Melinda, she didn’t write the article. I don’t think Melinda takes it personally if I was either, considering the amount of flaming I assumes she receives. I’m not going to hide behind an anonymous name, so surely I wouldn’t be deliberately rude. A difference in opinion over the Kanye clip is nothing new.
I feel frustrated that as a woman I’m meant to feel a certain way about this clip. Like I’m betraying the sisterhood if I don’t put my name to support petition. MTR has retweeted a few people’s opinions that I felt echoed this.
Hi Talia
Sure, sorry, it just kind of came across that way. I mean, there are worse things than a bad pun, right (although the comedy purist I married might beg to differ…)!
I’m interested that you have felt you are meant to respond to this issue as a woman. I mean, I haven’t seen all the tweets, but I would have said it’s an issue for everyone to at least think about – the glorification (or trivialisation) of misogynistic violence in mainstream media affects us all. Unlike the dead girls in the clip, you can make up your own mind about it and choose how to use your voice… if you don’t want to put your name to the petition, that’s your choice, one I would hope that any ‘sisterhood’ would support you exercising! If you feel uncomfortable about not signing, though, maybe it’s worth thinking about why..?
N
Compare these two characters:
1. Kayne West: he produces a multi-million dollar piece of media to be shown publicly throughout the world showing dead women in a way that’s designed to turn men on. This piece of media brings unprecedented worldwide legitimacy and normality to men’s private pornographic enjoyment of women’s pain and destruction. Any pretense that women are human begins to drop out of public discourse, and whole populations of women face real and imminent danger.
2. Melinda Tankard-Reist: she launches a campaign to block the public dissemination of a piece of media that is likely to seriously impact on the ability of women to publicly stand up against men’s private enjoyment of women’s pain and destruction. Her actions cause Talia to experience slight feelings of discomfort at the thought she’s letting down the sisterhood by deciding not to sign an online petition. On a brighter note, Melinda’s actions have the potential to stop the release of a film that could incite significant violence against women worldwide.
Put this way, Talia’s feelings of dis-ease are shown insignificant to the vanishing point. We might even say Talia should be embarrassed to have even raised them. People might think that, while Talia and her ilk raise petty objections, Rome burns.
Thank you, Melinda, for the humanity-level work you do on behalf of women and girls.
Oh, for goodness sake. You, Caroline Norma, can frankly piss off for telling me that I should be embarrassed for expressing that I do not want to sign a petition.
I hope you feel happy on your pedestal.
Can we talk about the models in the clip depicting the dead women AND took home a paycheck to do so? Shall they be damned as well, for aren’t they betraying the sisterhood for doing such a thing?
Feminism gets a bad rap because of sweeping, overly simplistic, guilting comments like yours, Norma. I hope you are busying yourself & creating numerous petitions that try to ban all movies, music clips, books, newspapers, et al that show violence against women as I’m completely at a loss on why the Kanye clip is the ONLY clip deemed worthy of a petition right now.