Meredith Graves educates us again. This time it’s on the self-serving and abusive language of male aggression latent in our culture at large but explicit in the track spawned from Sun Kil Moon frontman Mark Kozelek’s freakout at The War on Drugs.
Just to whet the appetite:
Which is why, in all likelihood, Kozelek chose to say “suck my cock” instead of “I think your band is bad.” “Suck my cock” is a command heard most often in two places: heterosexual porn, and schoolyard taunts between presumably straight boys. In no way does Mark Kozelek actually want his cock sucked by the members of the War on Drugs. What he wants is to make them feel violated, to make them feel submissive. “Suck my cock” is an order, not a request. “Suck my cock” is, when used by the wrong person, the language of physical force, the language of rape. He wants the world to know that he thinks TWOD sucks cock, implying that sucking cock is a bad thing. Who sucks cock? Not straight dudes like Mark Kozelek, but women and gay men. Which one of these groups is he using as an insult?
Read her entire essay published on Pitchfork.
