So I live on 8th and Minna St in San Francisco....only a few blocks away from the Folsom Street Fair, which if you don't know is a celebrated as "the grand daddy of all leather events" and really popular among the queer community. Basically if you were to walk out of my front door right now you would be met with a lot of leather, assless chaps, and dominatrix gear. BUT what I noticed today while walking around was, that on three different occasions coming from three different cars, I heard Shakira blasting on the speakers.
So now, I am kind of a bit curious. Why do you think this is? I know she has a large queer fan base but does anyone know particularly why? The only thing I could really come up with (while risking like I am stereotyping the gay community, which I hope I am not) was that her music still has that really electro-club beat you hear blasting out of gay clubs and at events like PRIDE and/or that she has that very empowered diva quality about her. But I don't really know much about queer culture which is why I decided to post here. I tried looking it up online but strangely couldn't find much.
But just for your viewing pleasure, which now that I think about it also has a bit of a dominatrix type of feel to it, I found this amazingly well done parody of a Shakira song that has apparently become internet famous:
Well--I think part of the answer has to do with the fair--even though the "leather scene" is seen as a pretty "white" thing--lots of Latin@s also have connections to that community, as well as to the queer community, so in that scene all the Latin@s in SF, makes sense that they would be blasting some Shakira.
ReplyDeleteAlso, how queer is the song and video She Wolf? In some of the scenes it looks like she's dancing in a huge vagina (I don't know what you guys think that pink cave looks like but I think of a vagina...) and then theres the lyrics about the She Wolf being in a closet and needing to be let out, plus the imagery of the closet and her escaping it (and then returning to it at the end..) I know those are some thoughts my self and other queer friends have had while hearing this song and watching this video, though I guess its debatable whether these things are deliberate or not on Shakira's part. we can at least hope so.
ReplyDelete