IShawna Still Fighting For “Equal Rights”

The Battle of the Bow Cats Rages On

Dancehall has long had  love/hate relationship with oral sex, but ever since Ishawna dropped her Ed Sheeran remix “Equal Rights and Justice,” a topic that’s been kept under cover for many years is not front and center. In an in-depth piece for Pigeons & Planes, the Reggae Girl About Town explores changes in social attitudes by-way-of song lyrics and insightful anaylsis.  “Most people think of dancehall as a very free and sexually charged genre, but Jamaica’s strong conservative Christian tradition extends to the music, particularly in “Bowcat” lyrics,” Reshma B writes. The story traces the origins of the Bowcat concept back to Shabba Ranks and traces it forward to Vybz Kartel and Wayne Marshall who sang: “Why you chewin’ it when you should be screwin’ it? I know you never see a curry or a stew in it!” With such a long-standing tradition Ishawna’s song was nothing less than a lyrical revolution with bars like ”Boy, me nah go compromise / Me wan’ feel how your head feels between mi thighs.” Coming 21 years after Lil’ Kim’s “Not Tonight” —the song where Queen B declared “You ain’t lickin’ this, you ain’t stickin’ this!”— “Equal Rights” has stirred up more backlash than Kim did in the ’90s.  Audio After The Jump…

“Dancehall’s Oral Sex Debate” examines the response to that song from artists like Spice and Queen Ifrica, and interviews thought leaders like Pat McKay of Sirius XM to find out where this Bowcat Business all began. Check the full story here

Here’s the song  that kicked off the controversy:

And a few of responses since the tune dropped this past Spring…

 

 

Finally some of dancehall’s OG anti-oral sex anthems

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EfEeeG-5T4o

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