PURPLEIZED3121 said:

luvsexy4all said:

now u will seehow important it is to see Prince as a work-in-progress....look how he matured spiritually and sexually thru his life (as we know it)

A very good point. Your point is very valid through the lense of his art & likewise very valid to the point of my original thread. Being honest i think its well evidenced beyong all reasonable doubt that in real life he was a player to the end!...with a trail of broken hearts left behind.

broken hearts r not just a thing out of players

sro100 said:

Why? Why???!

God I can't take all this WOKE bullshit!!

I GUARANTEE if we looked into YOUR life we'd find plenty to condemn you about in this hypersensitive bullshit environment.

Plus let's analyze EVERY movie and song that doesn't fit into today's environment and we'd be left with....nothing but boring boring things.

As a matter of fact we'd condemn every living being if we looked into every moment of a person's existence.

[Edited 3/4/19 13:33pm]

Had complaints filed against you, eh?

I think everyone should be tried in the court of public opinion.

onlyforaminute said:

I think everyone should be tried in the court of public opinion.

No thanks.

purplethunder3121 said:

onlyforaminute said:

I think everyone should be tried in the court of public opinion.

No thanks.

Ok, I'll be the one to say it..they were joking. I guess this is problem to begin with, though, isn't? People's interpretations of what's being said/ done (or lack thereof).

pricetag said:

purplethunder3121 said:

No thanks.

Ok, I'll be the one to say it..they were joking. I guess this is problem to begin with, though, isn't? People's interpretations of what's being said/ done (or lack thereof).

It's quite clear that he was joking. Didn't need your commentary for that.

Aaaand here we go with the shit-stirring...

pricetag said:

emesem said:

laytonian said:

Had complaints filed against you, eh?

206Michelle said:

emesem said:

Even in 1984, his treatment of women was questioned. See the dumpster scene in PR. Wendy's BJ act. and even the "Gangsta Glam" era "You, you and you get in the car!" etc...

As he got older, you can see he got much better. (see Better with Time, work with 3rd Eye Girl)

[Edited 3/1/19 7:24am]

I appreciate the point about how as he got older, his music was more respectful of/less disrespectful toward women. . The dumpster scene in PR has always bothered me. I don’t know who called the shots about hat scene (Prince, Magnoli, someone else). I think that the messages/attitudes toward women in his music from the 1980s and 90s are well within the average/normal range when compared with his peers contemporaries. He certainly pushed the envelope on sexual content, but I don’t think he pushed the envelope on misogyny. He frequently made himself into a sex object, e.g. When Doves Cry video.

It was controversial back when it was just a concept on paper, I hear quite a few WB eyebrows were raised, but (imho) it does the trick of letting you know Morris' character and it makes a bigger punch when you see he does have a conscious. If everybody played "nice and pc" it would have been a boring movie. I hate to say it in light of everything now but it is a fact, MJ had the goodie 2 shoes image cornered back then. Prince was "Rude Boy". It was intentional to the image, nobody NOW is making some grand discovery.

[Edited 3/21/19 17:53pm]

FullLipsDotNose said:

"A girl with guitar is twelve times better than another crazy band of boys

Tryna be a star in a misogynistic wall of noise"

onlyforaminute said:

206Michelle said:

emesem said: I appreciate the point about how as he got older, his music was more respectful of/less disrespectful toward women. . The dumpster scene in PR has always bothered me. I don’t know who called the shots about hat scene (Prince, Magnoli, someone else). I think that the messages/attitudes toward women in his music from the 1980s and 90s are well within the average/normal range when compared with his peers contemporaries. He certainly pushed the envelope on sexual content, but I don’t think he pushed the envelope on misogyny. He frequently made himself into a sex object, e.g. When Doves Cry video.

It was controversial back when it was just a concept on paper, I hear quite a few WB eyebrows were raised, but (imho) it does the trick of letting you know Morris' character and it makes a bigger punch when you see he does have a conscious. If everybody played "nice and pc" it would have been a boring movie. I hate to say it in light of everything now but it is a fact, MJ had the goodie 2 shoes image cornered back then. Prince was "Rude Boy". It was intentional to the image, nobody NOW is making some grand discovery.

[Edited 3/21/19 17:53pm]

Yeah, that scene in Purple Rain is played for comedy. And is designed to show that Morris is an asshole. Really not a big deal. At no point is it suggested that chucking a woman in a dumpster is normal behaviour.

People are waaaaaay too thin-skinned and precious these days.

Rimshottbob said:

jcurley said:

I think people may feel uncomfortable with some of his lyrics. However ultimately metoo etc is about subjugation. There's certainly an element of objectification but the women in his songs never feel subjugated or servile. There seems to be a mutual carnal desire. If anything Prince becomes submissive quite frequently. However that's more to do with fantasy than equality!

But subjugation and being servile is also consensually sexual.

.

involentary subjugation is different.

.

As I said when I first responded to the 'Lady Cab Drriver - rape' crap. People have too many issues about sex. And they interpret what they hear/see sexually according to their own thought process.

PUURPLEIZED3121, I've Never hear anyone think of that scene from Lady Cab Driver as rape.
Where did you ever get that from. What is your thought process or your life experiences that would cause you to process it that way?

PURPLEIZED3121 said:

We all know that P worshipped women & gave them endless career opportunities. Outside of the sphere of music he opened doors for photographers, creatives, designers, P..Park staff & many others. In this respect the man was incredible & his legacy on this front is firmly in tact & very much in keeping on where we are now.

That said when I now look at the songs/images/videos from day 1 through to say 2002 in particular some of it makes me cringe! The list is endless from Vanity 6, treatment of Apollonia in P. Rain, the Sexy MF video, raping Lady Cab driver [!] & many, many others. The message in some cases is filled with his own purple logic...Sexy MF shows a woman being subservient BUT what she does with her mind is what makes her a Sexy MF !! I could write for pages on this but y'all get the gist!

I would love your honest perspectives on this especially from the ladies on here. Do you feel uncomfortable OR is it just a case of context of the time?

Over to you.

Prince wore his underwear as outerwear, heavy makeup, high heels, sometimes flowing clothes and even dresses. Just like the woman around him. Seems like he treated them as equals?

kewlschool said:

Prince wore his underwear as outerwear, heavy makeup, high heels, sometimes flowing clothes and even dresses. Just like the woman around him. Seems like he treated them as equals?

Everything's dated. Gotta let each other grow as we will.

kewlschool said:

coldcoffeeandcocacola said:

emesem said:

Even in 1984, his treatment of women was questioned. See the dumpster scene in PR. Wendy's BJ act. and even the "Gangsta Glam" era "You, you and you get in the car!" etc...

As he got older, you can see he got much better. (see Better with Time, work with 3rd Eye Girl)

[Edited 3/1/19 7:24am]

Atta load of crap.

He was the only one to put the multigender band back on the spotlight since Gayle Chapman.
And Vanity 6 and Apollonia 6 are mostly about empowerment, not submission.

Wendy simulated head on stage follows a very bleak "never get married." in the movie.
That's why millions of viewers still don't make a fuss about it and get it's part of an inner turmoil.
And certainly people understand "Darling Nikki" as the result of a paranoid broken heart,
and not an insult to all women. To stick that outro says a lot about the assumed descriptive madness of Prince yelping with the larsens.

The Kid's manifesto is "boys can break hearts too".
Prince's obsession with feminity is such, he wants to taste the powers of seduction.
But his approach is to steal the woman's clothes and make-up, since Dirty Mind, maybe since Mattie's drawers.
As if it was that simple.
But that's a major rock'n'roll and human question,
right there: How does it feel for the other sex?
Prince embodied the problem.
He tried to incarnate it, all his career, and right there, you see there's no point in questioning his fascination about what is a woman, how do you seduce her, how do you fuck her, gently, roughly, with others disgusting as it seems?

How does it feel for the other sex?
Let's go in my daddy's car, I'll show you.
A quick fuck, and now I hurt like hell for weeks
thinking about When You Were Mine.

There's no sex without feelings. The "Sexy M.F." video tries to convey Prince is in charge, but watch the video again: she just slams him againts the wall. Even in the bed with Diamonds and Pearls, he looks like he's drowning. Plus, he takes her on the riviera, in a fine hotel. Now compare to the booties shaking that was emerging at the times, Prince is still the classiest ones while embracing the newly found nastiness women were fond of circa the nineties. And it was empowering in a way, bringing back the female subject as men's only obsession. "Pussy Control" is proof that by then, he understood some women better than themselves. Some funny songs can be dead serious at lines.

[Edited 4/2/19 14:07pm]

McD said:

The first four lines of The Morning Papers are troubling to say the least. Especially as they appear to be based on cold hard facts.

The first four lines of Nabukov's Lolita as well.
I think one needs to have gone through a relationship where age is nothing more than a number to appreciate it. No matter what sex you are.

"Cold hard facts" my ass.
No one knows squat except for Mayte.

Krystalkisses said:

I always sensed Prince had a chauvinistic streak though.

What about Dylan then?
Prince never went close to something as cruel as "Idiot Wind".
"Eye Hate U" is the equivalent, and in Prince world it's adourned with plush satin sonic cushions.
Even the fights are now seduction ("Blue Light"), which is testament of the personal evoution which always shows up in Prince's songs during his career, as he used them as a journal from the end of the eighties.

He did not shy away from the pain relationship brings. Maybe someone is confusing being angry at your partner, no matter what side you're on in the Sex Wars™.
Sex is rarely gratuitous, and Prince always bring the catholic (and cathartic) "price to pay" in his songs.
At the apex of his fame, he takes ten minutes of show bummer and tries to teach the danger of loveless lust to your average Reagan voter. But he does not shy away from the fact that desire can be a source of great emotional pain and anger ("Darlng Nikki" is not gratuitous. The whole final storm is all about "come back Nikki come back" call, not about masturbation).

So you have songs that are angry at women in Prince's repertoire. Of course. But from Stax/Volt/Motown era, you also had a lot of no-good men in pop, female solo acts and groups that accuse the many wrong ways of men (and women, but for a short period woman had implacable, condemning lyrics to spit out).

Prince perfected the art of the relationships song, where it's never just about sex. Sex is a mean, not the goal. Prince can get very psychoanalytical when it's about sex.
"Head" is a farce, but "Sister" also brings the spotlight back on the afro-american term,
and so it's not about incest anymore, it's about the overhelming power of the Woman.
Whose Sista puts Prince on the street again? Well Mattie of course.
But also the trusted one who gives you the first life-changing emotions you'll ever have and ultimately, it just so happens s.he doesn't give a fuck about you. The torture of unrequited desire is an enduring subject: "Set me free, why don't you babe", "Hit The Road Jack", "Do Yourself A Favour", "Most Of The Time", etc.

Can I stress again the importance of Prince sincerity ethos? And also, that his songs became a diary, and not albums anymore. It's just polaroids. If he was mad at a lost, or unnerving love.lust companion, Prince made a song about it, plain and simple. On the spot. And he grew honest enough to talk about sloppy noises, calling names, roleplay, the spectrum covered is very wide, and so the seemingly dimishments of women are not related to the fact they are females, but persons apparently worth of singing a rant or even a vengeance about.

A Prince song is never the definitive statement on a subject, as you could consider Prince's career as a constant refinement of the same (very good) concepts and ideas. What can you say that Shakespeare hasn't said before? Maybe someone gives too much credit to "Extraloveable", or underestimates the sick humour Prince always had.

#MeToo?
Prince and Madonna changed the minds of the Western World forever.
They completed the sexual revolution. So they're in great part responsible,
as Bowie, Mercury and other icons.

A logo is worth a hundred thousand million words, and it was there at maximum exposure, on the Purple Rain poster, right on the motorbike, in fact it's the closest thing to the lens. "I'm not a woman, I'm not a man", is a manifesto for gender transcendence as well as, sure, why not, some Holy Ghost impersonation. There's very often a duality in everything Prince writes, and you can bet yo ass it's calculated. Prince found a lyrical style, a romantic urban and very american one, in an odd modern lover past century gentlemen tradition, where the G-Spot is a big subject, an electric device a better lover, lesbians unattainable by nature, and all of these issues get confronted in Prince's book. I think he doesn't get the proper accolades for it.

And outside the art, as other have said, just look around him and his collaborators. The presence of women is perpetual.

[Edited 4/2/19 13:45pm]

Its a great question, but as a female I have always found Prince's songs to be all about pleasing a woman and what "he" can do for them rather than what they can do for him - which is so refreshing because in so much of today's music it is all about what men can get from women. Prince definately tapped into the romantic needs of a woman even when he was being "dirty" !!!!!!

gollygirl said:

Its a great question, but as a female I have always found Prince's songs to be all about pleasing a woman and what "he" can do for them rather than what they can do for him - which is so refreshing because in so much of today's music it is all about what men can get from women. Prince definately tapped into the romantic needs of a woman even when he was being "dirty" !!!!!!

gollygirl said:

Its a great question, but as a female I have always found Prince's songs to be all about pleasing a woman and what "he" can do for them rather than what they can do for him - which is so refreshing because in so much of today's music it is all about what men can get from women. Prince definately tapped into the romantic needs of a woman even when he was being "dirty" !!!!!!

.
The songs are one thing, but in real life he could be incredibly controlling and even micromanaging with his women, and I'm sure he mixed his dominant and pleasing sides.
.
Just watched the video of him and Mayte inducting Parliament/Funkadelic to the RnRHF the other day again, and one tiny reaction of his really made me frown: when P started telling the story of how Clinton sent him a tape "to pee on it", Mayte burst out laughing but P was incredibly quick to shush her. Some people would probably say I see too much into this tiny gesture but for me that looked alarming, especially as Mayte didn't say a word on stage, she was just there with P as eye-candy.
Prince's reaction looked way too controlling, as if he meant "Shush, this is my stage and my speech, stay quiet."
.