TikTalk: “I’m talking WAP” and how it exposes the double standard of female sexuality

When Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion released “WAP” this past August, its upbeat tempo and catchy lyrics inspired choreographer Brian Esperson to create a TikTok dance that soon became the #WAPChallenge. Everyone from TikTok influencer Addison Rae to the comedian-musician Jack Black tried their hand at the challenge, but the music behind this dance trend quickly turned into discourse about its provocative lyrics.

Many people — mostly conservatives — took to social media to share their immense detestation of the song’s lyrics. 

California Senate Republican candidate John Bradley tweeted: “Cardi B & Megan Thee Stallion is what happens when children are raised without God and without a strong father figure. Their new “song” The #WAP (which I heard accidentally) made me want to pour holy water in my ears and I feel sorry for future girls if this is their role model!”

Similarly, unsuccessful 2020 Republican Congressional candidate Deanna Lorraine tweeted from her now-suspended account that: “Cardi B & Megan Thee Stallion just set the entire female gender back by 100 years with their disgusting & vile ‘WAP’ song.”

While the controversy seems like it happened forever ago, I believe it is an important conversation to continue having. These responses are, as a reader, the epitome of feeling “disappointed, but not surprised.” What the popularity of “WAP” made clear was that there is only space in the men’s locker room to talk about a woman’s body or sexuality. All hell breaks loose if a woman sexualizes themself but when a man does, it is dismissed because after all, “boys will be boys.”

There is such a double standard — in rap music, politics and society in general — that women face on a daily basis. Men, especially in rap music, create hypersexualized images of women with their lyrics and no one bats an eye. The lyrics in Rapper BRS Kash’s “Throat Baby” holds nothing back, describing explicitly, the many erotic fantasies he hopes his partner — who is called numerous derogatory terms — pleasures him with. GQ even praises the song as “a melodic ode to sexual desire and the things it can drive someone to do.”

In songs like “Throat Baby,” women are seen as objects meant to pleasure men. On the other hand, it is taboo for female musicians to sing about their objectification because they need to be good role models for young girls. What about male musicians though? Shouldn’t they be role models for young boys? 

Slate curated a list of “The Dirtiest Hot 100 No. 1s of All Time Before ‘WAP’” and the majority of the songs on the list are performed by men. Songs like Sir-Mix-A-Lot’s “Baby Got Back” or Jason Derulo’s “Wiggle” are celebrated as party anthems. 

Take “Watermelon Sugar” by Harry Styles, for example. Anyone who knows me knows that I am a huge Harry Styles fan, but “Watermelon Sugar” and “WAP” are essentially about the same thing. In an interview with Zane Lowe and Styles, it is hinted that the song is a sexual innuendo about “the joys of mutually appreciated oral pleasure.” Even though the lyrics are less explicit than “WAP,” when people, or should I say Twitter, found out what “Watermelon Sugar” was meant to be about, it was laughed off and viewed as cheeky.

Any time a woman chooses to embrace their sexuality, a man is quick to express his opinion. If a woman wants to talk about her sexuality, she should be able to just like men are able to. If it makes people uncomfortable, then they need to reflect on the fact that their opinions are deeply rooted in misogyny. No man, woman or child is forced to listen to sexually explicit music, so they do not have to listen if they do not want to. 

When the people who are disgusted by “WAP” listen to the song’s lyrics, they feel as though women are doing the very thing that they wanted to stop: self-objectification; — but that is simply not true. “WAP” should stand for “We Abolish Patriarchy” because what Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion are doing is taking back power from male-dominated institutions — empowering women to choose how they wish to sexualize and sensualize their bodies.  

Trinity Gomez is a junior writing about TikTok and popular culture. Her column, “TikTalk,” runs every other Tuesday.