Chelsea
Morganelli
3/20/15
Blog 7
Today in class, my group led the
discussion of the reading On the Real:
Agency, Abuse, and Sexualized Violence in Rhianna’s “Russian Roulette”. A
part we chose to focus on was Rihanna’s song “Russian Roulette”. This song is
Rihanna’s reaction to being abused by Chris Brown. The reading reveals how some
people thought Rihanna brought the abuse on herself because Brown had
never done this before. Also due to Rihanna’s “bad girl” image they believed
she must’ve brought it upon herself.
People were giving reasons to blame
Rihanna for Brown beating her, “citing her previous rumored relationship with
Jay Z, her alleged transmittal of various sexually communicable infections to
Brown, and so on as likely causes for the attack. The assault on her character
continued over the following months with the leak of nude photos to the
Internet, all operating to justify Brown’s attack by delving into the
personal/private sphere of her bedroom behaviors to cast her well beyond the
image of a victim” (77). These incidents caused the blame onto Rihanna rather
than the actual abuser, Brown. It’s not fair that Rihanna was getting this
blame even though she did not do anything wrong. It is Brown who abused
Rihanna, yet Rihanna seemed to be getting all the blame for the beating she
endured. I’m glad Rihanna broke up with Brown because she is a role model to
many girls. It shows other girls that it is not safe to stay with someone that
abuses you.
I agree with what you said it's not fair that she was the one that was being blamed for what happened when she was the victim, and also is good that at the end she realize that because she is a role model for a lot of young girls she couldn't send the message to them yes stay with him because he loves you even if he hits you; because maybe she was lucky but who knows if any of these girls that see her as a role model could be as lucky as her.
ReplyDeleteToday's discussion was very interesting! It is so true that there is a constant wavering of standards that women are held to. I think Rhianna did what she individually needed. She did receive negative feedback for her video, but it is not our position to judge how she releases her emotion. Music should be a free platform for expression.
ReplyDeleteI actually did not know that she left Brown (for the second time) because she wanted to protect young girls and women from staying in abusive relationships. I believe that that was an incredible act on Rihanna's part, and I definitely think she deserves to be called a role model because of it. Though there are other parts of her career that may not send the right message to little girls and young women, its amazing to know that she understands the power her breaking up with Brown had, and she saved many women's lives by doing so.
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