Benito Martínez began his tour a few weeks ago around the world. It is the first and broke all ticket sales records. At 26 years old, he is the most listened to man in the world on Spotify and is also a different man.
In our country it is presented on November 4 and the two days in which the tickets went on sale, getting it was almost an odyssey. Hundreds of memes before the chaos and long virtual queues of more than 200 thousand people. What about the bad bunny? Why does it generate so much excessive furor? Well, to begin with, the link that this singer has with everything that is not a cisgender male is important when analyzing the phenomenon. Because it is not only his lyrics but also his poses, his clothes and his imprint. It is true, he is not the first artist to paint his nails, many passed by and of so many very little meant. In fact, Benito was linked to a very national controversy that questioned him for posing in women’s clothes for a well-known very international brand. The problem, in reality, came with a valid but at the same time quite useless questioning: brands and the media riding the wave of feminisms to make money. The famous pinkwashing or rainbow washing. Or we can also call it the adaptation of the capitalist system to the little things we now believe in and are convinced of. In turn, the accurate criticism of the applause dedicated to a man who is supposed to be heterosexual and cisgender in a world that, in reality, strongly discriminates against those who dress like this in the daily. That is, women and everything that is not a cis hetero male. In fact, the same brand after the publication of Bad Bunny, published another campaign with two men kissing and I swear they do not want to read the comments. That is, applause for one, stoned for others. In short, hypocrisy.
Benito usually dresses in “women’s” clothes, although when asked why, he replied that his clothes have no gender and that he is so canchero that he wears what is sung to him without that meaning much more than what is seen. Purses, aritos, braids with glitters. The “feminine” aesthetic is part of her closet and she knows how to play with it in a quite natural way. I heard that with these things it really only seeks to transgress but this analysis does not stay only with the aesthetic and, if we accompany fashions with ideology, transgression takes on another color. The world of reggaeton (and music in general) is complex and macho. The voices of the new generations seem to seek to change things but the lyrics sustain another discourse. Women appear to be hypersexualized objects, increasingly giant asses, money, brands, ostentation and whores. Above all, we, you whores. From the feminist movements the discussion about what we dance when we dance, is given. And although from the 60s until here things changed quickly and a lot, the cultural question of what and who makes you move the ogt is still almost intact but the right to dance is an engine. Eye. It is not the same situation for women of reggaeton or trap, who today have a lot of presence and also, several, gender awareness. But that’s not what this note is about. The problem of symbolic violence is also rooted in conservative looks that miss out on perrear and dance sweaty to the floor because 70% of the topics insult or underestimate us. And here I think there is a difference to make to continue, those of us who dance already know that what we hear is shit but we dance the same because reality is already sad enough. That seems much more like an evolution than the constant complaint about the repetition of patterns. Still, if we talk about Bad Bunny, that whole paragraph might not be there. This Puerto Rican singer sings, above all things, to single women. But not from the male gaze but from freedom. Ahre. Same if. The possibility of deciding, of warring, of going out with friends to dance and that a man is not necessary, is a reality in Benito’s lyrics. But not only that, the opportunity for a Bichiyal (derogatory but at the same time reivinidicadora way of naming lower-class women who wear branded clothes and are interested in money in Puerto Rico) to like both men and women, is there. In his lyrics the sexual reality of the new generations also exists. Bisexuality is part and breaks with the heteronorm imposed in many songs of his album YHLQMDLG (I do what I want).
Bad Bunny on NBC’s “The Tonight Show” with host Jimmy Fallon.
On the other hand, in 2020 when he appeared on Jimmy Fallon’s show, he opened his coat and showed a T-shirt that said “They killed Alexa, not a man in a skirt,” referencingThe transvesticide of Alexa Ruiz, a transgender, poor and homeless woman who was murdered after a photo of her went viral in a women’s bathroom of a mcdonadls. In Puerto Rico, that crime was a shock. Social networks were filled with photos of Alexa, taunts, memes and a day later, she was shot in a field. The phrase Benito used speaks of the artist’s commitment to the struggle of the LGBTQI+ community. Obviously, we know that it is not enough with a shirt but at the same time it is always better that it exists than that it does not exist. As I write this note I think how ridiculous to have to list the reasons why an artist is or is not a feminist. As if being a feminist could be measured, as if I, a random journalist from Argentina, had the power to say who is or who is not an ally. But the truth is that, in turn, I found many questions when talking about this topic. Questions that came to me, from girls who had canceled the bunny for the simple fact that he does reggeatón but also questions of his own. What we consume, why these cases are phenomena in sales, how, although we do not see it, the slow culture changes and our tastes, desires and massive passions, also do. When my mom was a teenager, she had to sit and wait for a boy to take her out dancing because otherwise she “ironed.” I mean, she sat all night. Several decades passed, a thousand things changed and this man lives up to an eclectic and still hostile current situation for everything that is not being a cisgender male. But at the same time it is incisive in something that today no one dares to even doubt: perrear alone is an acquired right. Important clarification: after having listened and analyzed the career of this singer, two things. The first is that I am in a position to maintain that Benito is piola alone, when he collaborates with other artists, there are more pifies and discomforts. And the second is that both this note and the video are analyses of what Bad Bunny has already recorded and done and are not valid for the future.
