I usually love all say anything songs, but the lyric calling out black people was Max punching down, and I despise it. It ruins the entire song. Punching down is never a commendable thing, and I understand that he had a dispute with a rapper, but he decided to make it a "you/your people" thing and talk to all black people. The different types of slavery were not even comparable, but to mention it, add hip hop afterwards, then half-assed be like "haha, I'm a brother too and I laugh at white people" was just poor taste. Namely, comparing slavery that came about as a means to pay debt (where you can become free after paying it off), then equating it to slavery where people were kidnapped and permanently sold as chattel on the basis of skin color is a false equivalency; so it's of poor taste to bring up, but it's also illogical in general. I thought Max was better than that, but seeing as though he still performs this song (last performance was in late 2020, I believe), I guess not. In keeping that lyric, he decided to exclude and demean his black fans. Also, he should take a hint towards how implicitly biased the lyric is, because somehow majority of these fan comments under the song were able to use his lyrics to be anti-black (an important fact being that a majority of Say Anything fans are white).
I only say all of this, because I love Max's songs and lyrics, but this song was such a miss because he decided to attack a group of already disenfranchised people, instead of just the person he had a dispute with.
(Btw, none of this has to deal with me being "soft," "pc," "Identity politics," or anything like that. I just gave a brief critique based on history, sociology, and philosophy/logic/rhetoric. Max could have done better as a human, so if you love that lyric, I implore that you do the slightest introspection as to why. You might find that you harbor stereotypes against black people, which you should work on getting rid of.)
I usually love all say anything songs, but the lyric calling out black people was Max punching down, and I despise it. It ruins the entire song. Punching down is never a commendable thing, and I understand that he had a dispute with a rapper, but he decided to make it a "you/your people" thing and talk to all black people. The different types of slavery were not even comparable, but to mention it, add hip hop afterwards, then half-assed be like "haha, I'm a brother too and I laugh at white people" was just poor taste. Namely, comparing slavery that came about as a means to pay debt (where you can become free after paying it off), then equating it to slavery where people were kidnapped and permanently sold as chattel on the basis of skin color is a false equivalency; so it's of poor taste to bring up, but it's also illogical in general. I thought Max was better than that, but seeing as though he still performs this song (last performance was in late 2020, I believe), I guess not. In keeping that lyric, he decided to exclude and demean his black fans. Also, he should take a hint towards how implicitly biased the lyric is, because somehow majority of these fan comments under the song were able to use his lyrics to be anti-black (an important fact being that a majority of Say Anything fans are white).
I only say all of this, because I love Max's songs and lyrics, but this song was such a miss because he decided to attack a group of already disenfranchised people, instead of just the person he had a dispute with.
(Btw, none of this has to deal with me being "soft," "pc," "Identity politics," or anything like that. I just gave a brief critique based on history, sociology, and philosophy/logic/rhetoric. Max could have done better as a human, so if you love that lyric, I implore that you do the slightest introspection as to why. You might find that you harbor stereotypes against black people, which you should work on getting rid of.)
@Plumbob Stfu, dude. You\'re totally missing the point of the song because your head is so far up your ass.
@Plumbob Stfu, dude. You\'re totally missing the point of the song because your head is so far up your ass.