Shake It for Me Girl

Last night I was driving in the car, listening to the radio and singing along, and looking at the beautiful scenery that surrounds Ithaca, NY.  I wasn't really thinking about what I was doing, but instead just enjoying the sunset and mindlessly singing along to the country song on the radio. As I'm singing along, I finally realize the lyrics to the song that I was singing. The chorus goes:

Shake it for the young bucks sittin' in the honky-tonks

For the rednecks rockin' till the break of dawn

For the DJ spinnin' that country song

Come on, come on, come on

Shake it for the birds, shake it for the bees

Shake it for the catfish swimming down deep in the creek

For the crickets and the critters and the squirrels

Shake it to the moon, shake it for me girl, aww

Country girl, shake it for me girl, 

Shake it for me girl, shake it for me

Country girl, shake it for me girl, 

Shake it for me girl, shake it for me

I snapped into reality when I was hearing over and over "Shake it for me girl" in a man's voice and was slightly disturbed. It never dawned on me: we all know the lyrics and sing them, but don't really consciously want to know the meaning. On the surface, it's about a guy trying to get a girl to dance. Under the surface, a girl, is becoming a sexual object for a man. She doesn't have a name and it's totally for his benefit. A lot of popular songs are like this.  I think that subconsciously we know what it means and that's the way the media and art works. In class we talked about where men learn their privilege in our society. I think it lies within the small things we hear, see, and even go along with everyday, even if we don't realize that these are the culprits of assigning privilege.