Are The Grammys Biased Towards Gay or Gay Friendly Artists?
One of the big winners during the 56th Grammy Awards was the duo Macklemore & Ryan Lewis. Their multiple wins include New Artist, Rap Song and Rap Album. The previous 55th Grammys featured multiple nominations for Frank Ocean who eventually won for Best Urban Contemporary Album and Best Rap/Sung Collaboration. A couple years before we saw gay champion and ally, “Born This Way” singer Lady Gaga rack up numerous nominations and awards.
With Macklemore & Ryan Lewis’ multiple wins this year, many around the blogosphere and talk radio circuit are suggesting that the Grammys are biased in favor of gay or gay friendly artists. Due to this bias some are suggesting that the academy is “giving” them the awards due to the music industry’s and Hollywood’s promotion of the “gay agenda”. Do you agree or disagree? Are popular gay or gay friendly artists Grammy bond simply for their positive stance on homosexuality and gay marriage?
Feel free to share your thoughts.
OckyDub
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I mean clearly there’s something to be said for an award show that conducts a wedding ceremony for mainly homosexual couples; but are they biased towards gay and gay friendly artists? I don’t think so. there’s not enough evidence to suggest that. However, I do feel that Kendrick Lamar should have won Best New Artist
I think most hollywood awards show are. I mean the industry votes on these things and the industry is likely mostly gay.
I think the awards are gay friendly to the straight artists. I don’t know which openly gay artists get this attention. Anyone remember Adam Lambert’s extreme AMA performance where he kissed his male bass player. Well I am not defending that performance, but the reaction from the Award show organizers and the public speaks volumes
The awards are a show, a presentation. Rarely does the so called academy honor those who actually deserve awards. That being said, Macklemore winning that award again another one of those moments. A show. An empty gesture, at least in my opinion. Furthermore, for a system to become biased toward a minority, said minority should benefit in some way. At least two of the artists mention in the question are cis- heterosexuals singing on the behalf of others. While I appreciate what such attention does in terms of awareness of relevant issues, such could be done without all the emptiness. So for me to even begin to consider that there is some bias, I want some actually queer artist to gain same recognition in the academy. Then I might consider if these awards are biased, until then…. seems like its just entertainment thats meant to keep the public talking. lol just my thoughts
I think the people who vote on these things were just tired of hearing the same ole homophobic and misogynistic shit year after year from the core hip hop artists. I firmly believe this was a protest give away by the grammy judges. And I don’t have a problem with it!
I may be alone in saying this, and although I’m all for gay marriage and equal rights, I am kind of tired of seeing gay people getting married. Honestly, I thought the whole getting married in the middle of the Grammys was corny. Gay marriage has been the most popular social and political movement over the past couple of years, and I think folks just want to jump on the bandwagon.
Guess its creating a more open atmosphere now. Starts with little things like this that will eventually lead to a gay man winning “Best Rap” album not a big deal.
I will not say that they are necessarily biased towards gay or gay friendly artists but I do find it odd that Macklemore and Ryan Lewis won these awards. Best new artist is fine. They have had many songs that I have enjoyed over the last year but best Rap Song and Rap Album. They beat out Jay-Z, Kanye, Drake, AND Kendrick Lamar. All of these artists dropped relatively good albums all in the same year and Macklemore and Ryan Lewis won. Does anybody else see anything wrong with this picture? Either way I was pretty disappointed with it.
I have wondered, for YEARS, what the qualifications of winning a Grammy is in its respective category. Kendrick got robbed. I don’t think the ‘agenda’ has anything to do with it though.
Tweet me@JeremyLCarter
I’m so late commenting on this post. But I wanted to say, I do think there could be a bias present. However, although I didn’t watch the grammy’s I’m going to go ahead and make a presumption that I strongly believe to be accurate. And that presumption is that I believe that the other artists in Macklemore’s categories had songs that were pretty much the same we’ve seen through the years, “love songs”, “getting girls at the club”, “how to be fly” etc. And he put out a song where the content was drastically different from all of that, so it would make sense he would get recognized. I mean he brought something different to the table.
And Reading this article made me think as I always do that I feel out of all races, that black people are the most homophobic. And when I say black I’m not just referring to African-Americans. I’m referring to Haitian-Americans, Jamiacian-Americans, etc. Because if someone were to tell me, “I have two friends one black and one white and only one of them is not homophobic”, I would instantly assume it’s the white one. Is that slightly ignorant of me? Sure. However, I do feel Caucasians and sometimes even that of Latin-Americans tend to be more open minded and accepting of other cultures. And we see this through television.
For example, I noticed when I watch some reality shows or fictional tv shows with predominantly Caucasian casts that the gay character is regarded as a true friend and they add depth to them. Where when it’s preodminantly Black, I feel the gay character or person is like a prop or there for comic relief and is not one to be taken seriously.
Here are some examples. Like on Tyler’s Perry’s “The Have and the Have nots”. The caucasian family seemed very okay with homosexuality where as the black family they are close to in the series is not. And that is just one of many examples. I mean I feel that’s why you rarely hear about “down low” guys or guys that would be considered to be “down low” in the Caucasian or Hispanic community. I noticed from watching Nollywood movies how they portray homosexuals as devious and not to be trusted. And I’ve noticed that in Haitian movies too. Whereas on Telemundo, the gay characters are given depth and a storyline. Someone weigh in on this with me, I would like to hear thoughts!