Since music became a ubiquitous commodity, it has been a form of protest and activism. In recent years, musical artists have been championed for their bravery in expressing feminist and LGBTQ-inclusive ideology. So a few feminist and LGBTQ icons have entered the mainstream. That’s great, but there are still systemic barriers in music that promote the straight, white, rich, male narrative.
The assumption in most music, as Mimi Nyugen explains, is that the default person in existence is “whitestraightboy” (2). In much of popular music, deeper political issues that disproportionately affect POC, female, and LGBTQ on a daily basis are not represented in the mainstream. It is hardly ever addressed that, “some people –white, heterosexual, middle-class, male– often travel in more comfort than others –nonwhite, queer, poor, female)” (Nyugen, 2). So often, popular/mainstream music and the latest hits fail to represent the majority of the population. THE WORLD IS NOT JUST STRAIGHT WHITE BOYS. But in mainstream music, it tends to appear that way.
Music is still a powerful platform to allow those oppressed groups to speak out about the issues that are not being addressed in their daily lives, and create a community with each other even when the mainstream won’t listen. Ann Powers writes about the role musicians played in publicizing and combating the AIDS epidemic of the 80s and 90s. Through the 80s, music addressing AIDS was mostly contained within the gay community, pop music not taking notice of the deadly disease until much later. However, at the time, “The epidemic’s realities did increasingly inform the music of scenes where gay men were more audible,” (Powers, 254). Through musicals like Rent and men’s choruses, awareness of AIDS spread, but knowledge of this disease was barred from the mainstream for too long, and there is systemic homophobia and fear of other narratives to blame.
Today, we are lucky to have easy access to music outside the mainstream. Streaming is wonderful in that sense! And, artists of all backgrounds are beginning to rise in the mainstream (Beyoncé, Frank Ocean, Troye Sivan, Cardi B, to name a few). But there is still a very straight and very male dominance in popular music today, and LGBTQ-inclusive feminist messages have yet to dominate popular music.
Related Songs
Below are examples of LGBTQ artists addressing the harmful impact of a heteronormative society’s influence on same sex relationships, and how that forces the people involved hiding their true feelings and who they are.
References
Nyugen, Mimi. “It’s (Not) a White World: Looking for Race in Punk.” Punk Planet 28. (PDF)
Powers, Ann. “Oh No, It Hurts: AIDS, Reagan, and the Backlash; New York, San Francisco, Seattle, 1977-1997.” Good Booty: Love and Sex, Black & White, Body and Soul in American Music (New York: Harper Collins, 2017). (PDF)
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