Using Your Words
I don't listen to R. Kelly anymore, but that doesn’t stop his songs from creeping into my thoughts. Recently, I was battling period cramps, breathing deeply and staring off into nothing while waiting for the max recommend dosage of ibuprofen to kick in, when the first couple bars of his Bump n’ Grind unexpectedly began playing on loop in my head. Sensuous, seductive—wrong?
If I’m being honest with myself, I welcomed the surprise; I couldn't have asked for a more perfect soundtrack for my mood and pain. It’s one thing for a canceled man’s song to roll up in my head from time to time, and quite another for me to queue him up on Spotify.
As a kid, I went through a phase where I called everything "crazy". Regardless of whether something was exciting or horrifying or sad, I deemed it “crazy”. At some point my dad had me replace the word “crazy” with how I actually felt, so he could better understand me, and I could better articulate myself (thanks, Abba). This is how I learned the importance of diction and specificity.
There are a lot of opinions out there on cancel culture. My issue with it is that it reduces a gamut of behavior to a single accusation. “They’re canceled” renders the same effect as my all-encompassing “crazy”. It lacks depth and principle, which inevitably leads to a communication breakdown—and likely why everyone has a fucking opinion on the matter. Only a fraction of cancel culture is about reckoning and justice; it’s also a way of declaring one's moral superiority (how can you possibly still find Bump n’ Grind seductive, let alone welcome it into your head?!). We apply our own personal histories and beliefs to decide who gets cut off, who gets a pass, who gets a slap on the wrist, and what the caveats are.
Image by Markus Winkler from Pixabay
In 2018, Marc Lamont Hill was fired from CNN after speaking at the United Nations on the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People. Hill condemned Israel for “normalizing settler colonialism", ending his remarks with "give us a free Palestine from the river to the sea". From my perspective, his actions were bold and heroic. Others, of course, will disagree.
Also in 2018, Aziz Ansari was accused of sexual misconduct in an article on Babe.net. While Ansari was slammed for abuse of power and misinterpreting consent, many believed the accusation trivialized the #MeToo movement. Seven years later, an episode of All Things Considered rings true for me:
Anna North: I was glad that he had apologized. I thought it was very believable that he said that by all accounts the activity was consensual. Like, I certainly believed that he had interpreted it as consensual at the time. And I thought, like, maybe that's where the problem lies. Like, she doesn't feel like this was at all what she signed up for. He feels like it was fine. That's really the crux of the issue here. So it's useful to read his statement along with her piece and say, like, look; here's a core failure of communication and something that as a society I think we need to work on.
In 2018, too, production of the “Surviving R. Kelly” documentary was green-lit. The doc premiered in 2019, and a domino of events ensued—RCA Records terminated Kelly’s contract, radio stations across the country banned his music, artists like Lady Gaga, Chance the Rapper, Celine Dion, and Ciara took down their songs with him. Between 2022 and 2023, Kelly was found guilty on nine counts of sex trafficking and racketeering and sentenced to a total of 49 years in prison.
Hill, Ansari, and Kelly were all canceled for extraordinarily different reasons: pro-Palestinian beliefs, misogyny, and child sexual abuse crimes, respectively. Only one of these is illegal. Hill now hosts “UpFront” on Al Jazeera English. Ansari is set to start out on a new North American stand-up tour later this month. Kelly remains disgusting, disgraced, and in prison. Which makes me so much more inclined to feel an overwhelming sense of guilt and shame when thinking about his music fondly. I have to ask myself, do I like R. Kelly? I used to. Do I miss his music? I don't, at least not enough to seek it out or play it. Am I upset a few of his songs have embedded themselves into the folds of my brain? Well, no. And why is that? Because I’ve set the boundary for punishing myself for his crimes.
It’s essential to know your line, to use your words. As a society, let’s be more precise and bold in our sentencing of others. Let’s make sure we understand ourselves so we understand one other as we demand reckoning where it’s due. And let's not be fucking jerks about it.