Along with 20 other universities the University College London student Union banned single song; Robin Thicke's 'Blurred Lines'. The biggest song of the year has become the most controversial of the decade, released at the end of March 2013 by the R&B singer along with Pharrell Williams and rapper T.I. This was a party jam about a oman who may or may not be interested in him in a night club. In April, a blogger branded this song as a rape song and Tricia Romano of the Daily Beast described it as 'rapey'. This caused uproar in other media outlets and may have escaped censure if it wasn't for the video! This includes three male performers being surrounded by scantily and sexually dressed models. There is also a version on VEVO where the girls are topless. In September, members of Project Unbreakable, a project devoted to rape survivors, help up placards comparing words spoken in the lyrics with words of their attackers. Kirsty Haigh from EUSA's vice president of services said that 'it promotes a very worrying attitude towards sex and consent' and that 'this is about ensuring that everyone is fully aware that you need enthusiastic consent before sex. The song says 'you know you want it' but you can't know they want it unless they tell you they want it.'
Thicke's hit had become part of a bigger debate about messages of pop lyrics and videos. Netmums published a survey claiming that 80% of parents had found their children copying explicit lyrics or dance movies from music vidoes, while Annie Lennox called for videos to be regulated in the same way as movies and having age restrictions. She claimed that she is all for freedom of expression but this single is clearly one step beyond and in the realm of pornography.
Lily Allen's new video 'hard out here' made reference to Robin Thicke and three organisations launched the Rewind&Reframe campaign with a strategy to enable young women to air their grievance about music videos, to campaign for age restrictions on videos, encourage compulsory sex and relationship education in schools and to pressure the music industry to get its house in order. Lia latchford says that across the board there is racism and sexism in videos and that women are sexualized especially black and ethnic minority women. She also said that young women have told them that it has an impact on their day to day lives.
Even Emily Ratajkowski, the most prominent model in the video, has said she is glad that people are criticising pop lyrics because she believes thats an important thing to do. When MC Rick Ross rapped on Rocko's single UOENO about spiking somebody's drink in order to have sex with her public outcry caused him to apolagise. US music critic Maura Johnston said that it boggled his mind and he disagrees with what the public ae saying about it. She suggests that 'its an easy target because Robin Thicke is kind of slimy.'
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