#i have very little interest in like the classic epics cuz i mostly wanna read about stuff that only modern books seem to touch on

[ecofear]

twitter keeps showing me people admitting never to reading the odyssey and other people hounding them for being stupid and uneducated and im sitting there like ... dont tell any of them i havent read it either. i want to live

[bearhatarmy]

Here’s a hot take from conservative pundit and massive transphobe music fan, Ben Shapiro. Normally I would tackle the more serious topics Ben discusses, but this really felt like it deserved a response. 

Though, if I wanted to take a more serious angle, I suppose I could make the argument that rap is a huge part of the black community’s cultural identity & heritage and by belittling it, Ben is insulting and diminishing one of a marginalized group’s main creative outlets that they use to communicate their struggles. 

But that would be racist! Ben isn’t racist! He is constantly explaining over and over just how not-racist he is. Which is what all non-racists have to do. 

This has nothing to do with racism and Ben has some solid FACTS explaining why.  

HE LIKES JAZZ, OKAY? 

AND OPINIONS ARE NEVER RACIST. 

I GUESS.

EVEN THOUGH HE SAID IT WAS A FACT.

So, to be clear, this will just be a not-serious analysis about Ben’s totally not-racist FACT that rap is not-music. 

Let’s get this not-party started...

You see, Ben is famous for his motto, “Facts don’t care about your feelings.”

He’s even leveraged his factual wisdom and made it into merchandise. 

That’s a real thing people can buy. It even has 6 whole reviews on Amazon! 

Beyond the Box rated it with 3 stars saying, “It's okay but small.” 

(Aww, just like Ben!)

And Tim S. described the shirt’s fit as “Liberals are destroying the country.”

(I’m pretty sure that means it’s a tad itchy.)

Before I saw Ben’s factual tweet, I really FELT like rap was an amazing musical artform. It took poetry and made it musical. It gave people a new way to express themselves that didn’t require expensive music lessons or even instruments. A friend could just bang on a table while you let it flow. It made creating music more accessible. And as long as you had good rhythm you could participate. It FELT groundbreaking at the time. 

The very first cassette tape I bought was Good Vibrations by Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch. (I know that isn’t a great start, but I was like 10, okay?) The very first compact disc I bought was 2 Legit 2 Quit by MC Hammer. (Don’t laugh, he was the shit in 1991.) As I reached my formative years, I started listening to DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince, Beastie Boys, and House of Pain. 

I jump’d around. (squeeEEEEEee)

But as some of you may have noticed, most of my musical selections were very mainstream. You’ve probably also noticed that I am very... white. 

To this day, even! I think it is a chronic condition. 

My skin is near translucent due to lack of sunlight. I often say things like “indubitably” and “bloviate” and “I’m sure this chicken will be fine with minimal seasoning.” And at one point I owned the entire Creed discography. 

I was in desperate need of a Hip Hop education. 

Now using the official Rules of Republican Conduct™, if I want to talk about something with a racial component, all I need is a single black friend. This will absolve me of any consequences. 

Interesting Froggie Fun Fact... I went to a mostly black high school! 

Check this out...

That’s TWO black friends! 

Shawn is the one teaching me a complicated handshake I instantly forgot. And Marcus is photobombing us in the back there. 

I wish I could say our school was super progressive and everyone got along dandy. But in the mid-90s that just wasn’t the case. There were no major conflicts, but a lot of the white kids would sort of... self segregate. They’d all choose lockers in the same area. They’d sit in the same area at lunch and in class. And not a lot of them would interact with black kids outside of school. 

That said, I did not get the segregation memo. I got along with everyone. I’m not saying I was some amazing colorblind trailblazer crossing racial boundaries at every turn. My locker was in the white section too. And I only had two black friends (not pictured) that I hung out with outside of school. 

But I do think humor can break down a lot of barriers. And I used comedy to cross those invisible lines from time to time. 

Do you remember “Yo Mama” jokes? 

Like uhhh... Yo mama so old, her social security number is 1.  Yo mama so lazy, she stuck her nose out the window and let the wind blow it. Yo mama so classless, she’s a Marxist utopia.

You get it. 

Before school or before class, a lot of kids would have these competitions. They would face off with their best motherly insults and typically the person who received the loudest “OH DAAAAAAMMMMN!” would be declared the winner. 

One day I just kind of decided to make fun of Shawn’s mama. After a few seconds of stunned silence I got the loudest OH DAMN of anyone and we were suddenly friends. And then his friends were my friends too. Our friendship didn’t go outside the school premises, but it was still a lot of fun joking around with them at lunch or when we were supposed to be doing homework.

Shawn and I started a sort of cultural exchange. He would tell me about all of the amazing music he was into. And I explained why Batman: The Animated Series was not a kid’s cartoon. IT WAS ANIMATION. Says it right in the name.  

He introduced me to a wide range of artists of color. Old and new (at the time). We talked about Boyz II Men, Stevie Wonder, Michael Jackson, Prince. He introduced me to Mary J Blige who I follow to this day. And Aaliyah :(

He also told me about not-music. 

Ya know... rappers. 

I’ll be honest, sometimes this was challenging for me. I did not like or understand everything he suggested. I had a lot of racist baggage leftover from an all-white Catholic elementary school and my brain resisted for longer than I care to admit. But after seeing Shawn’s passion for this not-music, I became rap-curious and willing to keep an open mind. 

Let me try to name-drop from memory... 

Puff Daddy, Lauryn Hill, Wu-Tang Clan, Naughty By Nature, Snoop Dogg, Nate Dogg, Dr. Dre, Biggie Smalls, Ice Cube, and some guy named Tupac Shakur. You’ve probably never heard of him. 

He’d even sneak a Walkman in his backpack so he and his friends could sample his latest acquisitions. 

He’d be like, “Hey Ben, you want to listen to some Master P?” And I’d be like, “Sure! You wanna listen to Nine Inch Nails?” And he’d be like, “Naw, I’m good.”

Okay, so the cultural exchange could be a bit one-sided at times. But Batman bonded us all.

Admittedly, when I was at home, I still mostly listened to Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, and Stone Temple Pilots on repeat. And I do not listen to a great deal of Hip Hop these days. Mostly due to lack of guidance. I don’t have a Shawn in my life anymore. (But that Cardi B Money song was crazy good. And I’m not just saying that cuz the video had boobs.) 

Shawn was able to get me to a place where even if I didn’t like what I was listening to, I understood why other people enjoyed it. I really learned to appreciate rap and many of Shawn’s suggestions made an appearance on my super rad 90s Winamp playlist. 

Sometimes when I was having a bad day, it was nice to have a good day to fall back on. 

So when I was very whitely bobbing my head to the beat of that communal Walkman, I didn’t think my friends were stupid. I didn’t think I was stupid. I didn’t FEEL stupid.

But facts are facts. And my feels about facts don’t matter.  

You see, Ben Shapiro is known for being a master debater. You can find videos of him CRUSHING LIBRULS WITH LOGIC. Or DESTROYING FEMINISTS with TRU FACTS. Perhaps even DEMOLISHING SOCIALISTS with STATISTICS. 

His big Harvard brain is pretty relentless when it comes to DESTROYMOLISHING The Left.  

He’s great at taking standard conservative talking points, couching them in academic speak, and peppering them with dubious facts that don’t always hold up to scrutiny after the fact. Some might argue he cherry picks his opponents and the subject matter, creates scenarios where his point of view will be well received, and uses bad faith tactics to give the appearance of the upper hand. 

But that would be speculation and this post is all about FACTS. 

And Ben’s facts are too powerful to dispute. I doubt anyone is up to the challenge. Not even a transgender woman with epic makeup, glorious costumes, creative lighting schemes, and a degree in philosophy could take him to task. 

It’s just... unpossible.

*cough* Contrapoints *cough*

Sorry, had a froggie in my throat. 

SO... let’s see Ben defend “rap isn’t music” using his fancy debating skillz. It took him 6 years to come up with this, so I’m betting it’s bulletproof. 

OH I SEE. 

He plays CLASSICAL music. 

CHECKMATE, RAPPERS!

Ben Shapiro DESTROYGASMS Hip Hop with UNDERWHELMING TWEET.

If you’ll allow me to expound his logic, being a classically trained musician makes you more specialer than a regular musician. It makes him an arbiter of what is and is not music. I forgot that classical musicians were automatically given that power. 

I know Ben only ever presents facts, so I’d like to take him at his word, but I think I’d like to see this music master perform something. Just to be sure he has the proper classical credentials to make these bold claims. 

Here is a music video he produced for The Daily Wire. Clearly a high budget homage to one of the most thrilling television themes in recent history.  

Did anyone else feel like they were watching 3 robots play the blandest arrangement ever conceived? Or was that just me? SUCH ENERGY. 

I will say, those special effects were... something. 

And Ben really PWNED CNN. I’m sure they felt that slice all the way in their Atlanta headquarters. 

Ben, if you’re reading this, that video was totally funny in the way you intended. People are definitely laughing with you and not at you. I didn’t cringe even a little. 

But does this prove that Ben is a proper CLASSICAL musician? With all the power and privileges that entails? 

Does he have the authority to judge musical worthiness?

Despite his robotic performance, I suppose he did hit all the correct notes and everything. 

Is music like facts? Does music care about your feelings? 

I think what we need is a comparison. Something we can judge Ben’s performance against in order to gauge his level of classical musicianship. 

This is Tina Guo.

She is a Chinese-American immigrant from Shanghai. She moved here at the age of 5. She probably was able to sneak in because there wasn’t a border wall yet. She is taking the jobs of American classical musicians. Probably why Ben isn’t in a top-tier symphony orchestra as we speak. 

Tina is a cello prodigy who was trained classically. She attended the USC Thornton School of Music for professional cello studies on a full scholarship where she studied under Nathaniel Rosen and Eleonore Schoenfeld--some of the most influential cellists of the 20th century. 

She also made a huge splash on YouTube casually playing Flight of the Bumblebee as a teenager. No biggie. I’m sure Ben can play that too. 

Oh, and do you remember that badass Wonder Woman theme written by famous composer Hans Zimmer?

That was her playing the lead.

Now for the comparison. 

Watch Librul Immigrant DESTROY the Game of Thrones theme that she arranged ALL BY HERSELF without the help of a BIG STRONG MAN.

I don’t know. 

I think that was a smidge better than Ben’s version. 

What do you folks think? 

So here is the dilemma. 

We have two CLASSICAL musicians who are at nearly identical skill levels...

HOWEVER... after some investigation... 

It’s possible Tina Guo thinks rap... might be music.

*GASP*

THE EVIDENCE

One of her favorite ways to practice improvisation is to jam along with Hip Hop tracks she finds on YouTube.   

Now, conservatives like Ben LOVE dictionary definitions. It’s their go-to debate tactic when trying to legitimize the idea of racism toward white folks. So let’s use the dictionary really quick. 

When I looked up what this “jamming” word meant, it sent me to “jam session.” I was shocked by what I found.

Musicians? MUSIC? But those backing tracks she practiced to were used for rap non-music. BEN I AM CONFUSED.

I think I need to dig deeper. 

After scouring the internet for almost 2 minutes I was able to find something even more shocking.

Here is LIBRUL CLASSICAL SNOWFLAKE IMMIGRANT FEMINIST MUSICIAN sharing the stage with a CUCK NON-MUSIC RAP ARTIST.

That kinda looks like Tina Guo... and LUPE FIASCO. 

*DOUBLE GASP*

And I’ve double checked this... it seems this Lupe fellow is definitely a rapper. 

WHAT IS GOING ON HERE? 

I mean, she has her cello. And he has a microphone. But it’s a FACT that rap isn’t music. So I guess they are doing some experimental anti-music performance together. 

ANOTHER SHOCKING IMAGE HAS COME TO MY ATTENTION AFTER ANOTHER 12 SECONDS OF GOOGLING.

What the heck, Tina? 

Why are you, A CLASSICAL MUSICIAN, on a stage with Common? Another rapper! 

I’m a little worried that Tina might be stupid. 

Ben’s FACT clearly states if you think rap is music, then you are stupid. 

And not only is Tina playing music near a rapper... I’m pretty sure she is playing music WITH a rapper. 

That’s like... double stupid. 

I really don’t know what to feel about these facts I’ve uncovered. 

These FACTS kinda FEEL like bullshit. 

At least I can take comfort in the absolute fact that Ben Shapiro is a solid 5 feet 9 inches tall. It gives me comfort knowing he can ride any roller coaster he wants.

Sick burn, Ben. Though you’re kind of implying that when Milo sees you he is giving you blowjobs. I’m sure you’re fine with that implication. It’s not like you’re homophobic or anything, right? 

The important thing is that everyone knows how you’re a big boy. Two inches taller than Napoleon!   

I mean, it would be silly to lie about such a thing so easily disproved, right? And there is nothing to be ashamed of if you are a shorter individual. My mom is short I think she’s the best! 

So I’m confident you are 5′9″ as you have stated.  

I CAN’T FEEL ANY MORE FACTS, BEN. 

MY SOUL CAN’T TAKE IT. 

You know what... screw it. 

I’m going to make it serious. 

Not liking rap isn’t racist. 

Telling people they are stupid for liking rap is super racist. 

And being too stubborn to apologize for a 6-year-old tweet compounds that racism. 

Liking jazz is just the musical version of “I have a black friend.” 

Not understanding that rap is a cultural staple vital to the black community and then comparing it to frickin’ Titanic makes it profoundly racist.

And... *takes a deep breath* continually defending a shitty 6-year-old tweet as recent as last July, even though you could probably just apologize, blame it on youthful ignorance, delete it, and never have to deal with it again, just because you can’t ever admit you ever said anything wrong... 

Well, that just makes you look...