A Thug's Humanity?
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A Thug's Humanity?
At this point--as if there was ever a previous point--any discussion about the artistic merit of Curtis Jackson's "music" is little more than a banal exercise in corporate music journalism. Mr. Jackson has never been interested in art, no matter how we might shift the signifiers to fit into the expectations of a music industry that seems to have little use for actual music. Yet Mr. Jackson's literal body and its cartoonish doppelganger, 50 Cent, continue to stimulate curiosity, if only because of his deft performance of late stage American masculinity.
Considered purely within the context of a constructed masculinity, 50 Cent might rank as one of the most compelling examples of black masculinity since Jack Johnson. Signature generational figures like Malcolm X (El Hajj Malik El Shabazz) or Tupac Shakur, challenged notions of black masculinity in their respective historical eras, in part, because they complicated how black masculinity functioned in distinct political, cultural, social, religious and sexual spheres. In the case of Jack Johnson it was the blunt force of his masculinity and the anxieties produced in response to fears of how that force might be employed beyond the boxing ring, that made him the projection of so many racialized and gendered fantasies. In the case of Mr. Jackson such fears are purely the product of the capitalist wet dream that literally feeds upon--consumption as literal practice--the "body" 50 Cent willingly provides.
If Forbes Magazine can credibly describe Mr. Jackson as a "masterful brand builder", what exactly is his brand? I would argue that it is literally his body--a body offered up for whatever sexual confection we can concoct as easily as it becomes the "bootstrap" muse for a generation of vitamin water addicted professionals. Two decades ago popular comedians like Chevy Chase and Eddie Murphy were described as "Reagan's Jesters"; In 2007 Mr. Jackson is clearly Bush's "nigga"--the literal embodiment of three centuries of American hegemony in the capitalist and militarist realms--allowing us to dually pleasure and replenish our fears--with the ease of an I-Tune transaction--in a moment of distinct uncertainties about national security and an eroding infrastructure.
And it is his body that Mr. Jackson asks us to consider as he attempts to stall the feeding frenzy. "Don't think I'm not human," Mr. Jackson quips in London's Sunday Telegraph, presaging the provocative insert photos--shot by Alexei Hay--that accompany Curtis. Stunning is the fact that when you see Mr. Jackson sitting down to a helping of 9mm--a piece of the weapon is carved out and sits on the fork in Mr. Jackson's hand--there's not even a hint of irony present. So successful has been Mr. Jackson's melding of his body to corporate imaging that even the most absurd image is rendered as logical. The same goes for the photos of Mr. Jackson donning sport jackets reading the New York Post befitting a man rumored to worth half-a-billion dollars in the era of the "News Corporation-ing" of mainstream media.
Taken as a simple gesture though, the photo's of a bare-chested Mr. Jackson hoisting [insert brown-skined celebrity eye-candy of your choice] in the air as she straddles his waist, is nothing more than what we might expect from somebody who uses phrases like "Candy Shop" and "Amusement Park" to describe sexual intercourse. Seeing Mr. Jackson's large hands on the woman's buttocks captures the kinds of wordless objectification that policing hip-hop lyrics will never address. But in the very next frame, it is the women's probing hands that exploit the metaphor that exists inside Mr. Jackson's pants--and it is in that moment that Mr. Jackson is bore naked, capturing for a fleeting moment the very pleasures associated with black masculinity, while rendering said black masculinity flaccid in the aftermath.
That the black body that keeps America warm in bed is so often the boogeyman that keeps America up at night is not a new phenomenon. In the case of Mr. Jackson though, he has at least demanded that he be well compensated for all of his labors. That Mr. Jackson has managed to get paid for what is little more than auction-block theater, is significant I think.
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