Originally posted by Noisey

At best, “Baby Got Back” is a celebration of black heterosexuality as narrated from a man’s perspective. At worst “Baby” has become a facile symbol people who don’t know much about hip hop use to represent everything they think is misogynist about hip hop culture. Which is unfortunate, because that is a really hot record. (In fact, its irresistible funk might be one reason “Baby” continues to be so well-known and well-liked, whereas other novelty records from the same era have been forgotten, or relegated to a VH1 special.) As the discussion on the “Ladies of reddit, what’s a totally misogynistic song that you love anyways?” thread shows, “Baby Got Back” is a prominent example of songs women like in spite of their lyrics.

“Anaconda” recontextualizes both “Baby”’s bass and its narration of women’s bodies. Mix-A-Lot raps about his desire for a certain kind of female body. Minaj raps about her enjoyment of her body, how she feels in her b/ass, not how she feels about it.

Reworking “Baby”’s music, “Anaconda” provides women the opportunity to enjoy the b/ass without qualification. Putting the bass riff in a context that affirms women’s sexuality and puts men’s objectification and other women’s body-policing in check, “Anaconda” is like a sonic ****-block that prevents men and body-policing white women from crashing the party. The repetition and stuttering of the line fragment “My anaconda don’t” performs this checking--it stops male desire in its tracks. It also represents male desire as something of a shortcoming, as something that just “don’t.” Male desire don’t have b/ass, either. Whenever “Anaconda” samples from “Baby”’s lyrics, the bass riff drops out. (It’s not under these lines in the original, either.) When Minaj raps about her body, the bass is there; but when other people (Mix-A-Lot, “Becky” and her friend) express their feelings about Minaj’s ass, the bass is absent. Nicki mocks the idea that thick women’s bodies are valuable because men like them. Right after the break, she says “Yeah, he loooove this fat ass,” and follows that line with a cackle that reinforces the sarcastic tone in which she delivered it.Here, b/ass is something women can enjoy without interference from horny men who love b/ass, or judgy women who harp on its imperfections.

[...]

Minaj’s meter and rhyme scheme are much less strict in this section--thoughts spill over rhythmic phrases, and there’s really not much rhyming to speak of. And then there’s Nicki’s trademark non-verbal sounds, her snorts and growling inhale. If you didn’t know this style of rapping is actually harder to pull off than the relatively “primitive” style of the first half (and, frankly, pop audiences that don’t know much about hip hop aesthetics may not know this), you might think Minaj was being lazy here. But actually what she’s showing is that pedantic rules and conventions are irrelevant to her pleasure--in performing, in music, in her body, in solidarity with other women. (This technique of meeting standards only to then reject them is a classic feminist strategy. When women do something “different,” they’re generally judged incompetent--the assumption is that they’re incapable of “perfection” rather than intentionally rejecting it.)In “Anaconda,” feeling good isn’t a matter of being perfect down to the last inch; it’s about being in an affirmative, supportive space--here, the club--where you can get high on your own greatness, snorts and all.

[...]

“All About” and “Anaconda” both use the b/ass metaphor, but in very different ways to vastly different ends. These differences reflect broader trends in feminist approaches to pop music. As scholars like Judith Peraino have argued, white feminist music (in particular, the “women’s music” singer-songwriter genre) generally uses lyrics (and, sometimes, visuals) as the tool to do its feminist work. Black feminist music, on the other hand, tends to work in the sonic, and to work the sonic against the verbal and visual dimensions of pop performance.

Originally posted by AnneBoleyn

why is she dissing skinny girls?

I said, where my fat ass big bitches in the club?
**** the skinny bitches! **** the skinny bitches in the club!
I wanna see all the big fat ass bitches in the mutha****in' club
**** you if you skinny bitches, what?!

Originally posted by EnigmaPopstar

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Originally posted by Billionaire✖Boy

Originally posted by qurl

Okay I love Nicki but are we being serious? not every song by an amazing female *has* to be a feminist anthem, some songs are actually pretty void of pretentious messages and are just fun tracks

Anaconda is growing on me, but feminist anthem it is not

Originally posted by Stevie

You don't need to read any articles to know that the title of "feminist anthem" is just some ******** that people are trying to label "Anaconda" and "All About That Bass" as to try to justify them. The messages of both songs are slightly off and they go about any attempts at feminism in a backhanded way. Instead of telling the story of a woman who is comfortable with her plus-sized figure and/or fat ass because she thinks she looks good or because she just doesn't care about beauty standards, both songs ask for validation from men. "Bass" exhibits Trainor feeling validated because her mother says that MEN like more junk in the trunk to play with. "Anaconda" is very similar, saying that a man would rather **** a woman with a big butt rather than a small one. Both turn to the man for validation instead of looking inside themselves and saying "you know, I like what I look like and I don't care what anyone else thinks". The two songs are playful and somewhat celebratory, yes. But they are not feminist.

Originally posted by Aatthew

Originally posted by qurl

Well you and I are just gonna agree to disagree there. I think if you dissect anything enough, you can make it into anything.. next 'Milkshake' will be seen as an empowering anthem that told females to take control of the patriarchal societal perceptions and blah blah blah..

But again, I just don't think everything has to be taken so seriously or has to be so deep. Maybe that's just me.

Originally posted by Billionaire✖Boy