The Ravonettes: Boys Who Rape

Some very powerful and extreme sentiments from Danish music duo The Raveonettes.

Boys Who Rape (Should All Be Destroyed) off their latest record In And Out Of Control is song about, well, destroying boys who rape. It's a hard emotion not to agree with, specially after looking at the verse lyrics:

Three to one girl
How can you win
One horrid night
You hope that it's a bad dream

They rip you to shreds
Make you feel useless
You'll never forget
Those f*ckers stay in your head

Albeit a bit extreme. I guess it depends on your definition of 'destroyed' and whether or not you've been a victim of rape.

Personally, my version would go "Boys Who Rape (Should All Be Punished Via The Judicial System Then Must Attend Educational Seminars On Gender Violence, Equity And Male Privilege, While Incarcerated)"

Regardless, the song is infectious and you can't help but be awed by the doo-wop outro of the title lyrics.

Warning! Graphic content below!



Maybe they mean destroyed by love?



Check out their myspace page here.

Walk A Mile Toronto PSA

White Ribbon Campaign Video

Produced originally as our power point presentation for the Global Symposium.

Now converted to video, please share and spread the word.

The Chairman - MTV Exit

Next time someone tells me that we are anti-male (which we're not - I am a man and I am not anti-me) and we that shouldn't be focusing only on men (and how they can get involved to address male violence against women) and women are just as violent towards men (not true), I am going to show them this documentary from MTV Exit, a series of docs and short films that aims to increase awareness and prevention of human trafficking.

View this movie at cultureunplugged.com

And while I am aware that trafficking affects both men and women, sex-trafficking is the largest subcategory of modern-day slavery. And although I have no facts to back this up, I am going to go out on a limb and say that most of those trafficked for sex are women, and I'll bet the majority of traffickers, and those seeking the services (sex) of trafficked women (although certainly not all) are men.

Rachel Brown - Learn To Love Me

I wouldn't normally post music that has a domestic violence message since they are almost always, even with the best of intentions, far too saccharine and emotive for my personal taste. Let's face it, I am a music snob.

And it was with this unfortunate bias that I clicked on a link in someone's twitter feed to Rachel Brown's video Learn To Love Me (I could not find it on youtube and failed to figure out how to embed it otherwise, but you can see it here) which is inspired by Brown's feelings that people should "place a higher priority on learning to love and value who you are over the love you give someone else."

I dig the old soul vibe and it immediately reminded me of one of my favorite songs, One Mo' Gin by D'Angelo; a song about longing for a past love but having the strength and courage to live your own life and let them live theirs (and no it's not "One Mo' Gin" by Chris Brown - which is song about being pushy and basically demanding a girl to get with him - stay classy CB!)

Love Gone Wrong Clips Online

Unfortunately MuchMusic isn't providing an embed for their video clips of Wednesday's MuchTalks episode 'Chris Brown and Rihanna: Love Gone Wrong', but you can watch the episode, in four parts, here.

The show was a bit disappointing. It was hard to take the many of the 'celebrity' 'pundits', few of whom have any professional experience dealing with issues relating to domestic violence, and therefore should not have been presented as authority on the subject, seriously.

Danny Fernandez contradicted himself right off the bat by stating first that it was ok to still love Chris Brown's music because "him as an artist and him as an individual are two different things." But he then agreed that an artist's personal life and the music they create an inextricably linked and "impossible" to separate. So which is it?

Few of the other pundits had anything concrete to say that wasn't mere gossip, although X's comment that all girls should learn self defense was, thankfully, shot down by the professional commentators from YWCA, Kids Help Phone and yes, White Ribbon Campaign and even the hosts themselves.

Aside from one audience member's baffling statement that "Rihanna pushed (Chris Brown) to the point... where he couldn't stop himself" the majority of the youth on hand seemed to agree with WRC's Tuval Dinner that "nobody deserves to be hit no matter what they do to provoke somebody else."

There's an interesting (albeit brief) rundown of the episode on AOL Music Canada. Apparently MTV aired a similar special that was even more exploitative of the issue and images.

Due to the celebrity status of Chris Brown and Rihanna, the underlying issue when people are discussion this particular case of alleged domestic violence is how esteemed gossip editorialists have become. We regard these people as an authority on all things.

But I digress. I should have just said:

Celebrity pundits: boo!
Proffesional pundits: yay!

Student Film

Three students from Parkdale made this video for White Ribbon activities.

It was not done as a class project or for marks, they just wanted to do it to get a message out to kids who might need to know what to do in a case like this.