Sabrina Murray

Recently the Grammy award ceremony was celebrated and there has been a lot of talk about who won. I personally have never paid much attention to these awards and I only know these ones happened because of the huge commotion surrounding Neil Portnow. This man, the President of the Recording Academy, sparked a huge backlash when he said that women in the music industry need to ‘step up.’ This caused a huge up roar in the community especially since the movement #MeToo is going on. A lot of women are arguing that it is not the lack of women ‘stepping up’ but more that women are being shut out of the industry. Women did exceptionally well in the Grammys this year with many of the categories having female artists. The category for best pop solo performance was dominated by women with Ed Sheeran as the only male artist who ironically won. There were many other categories like, best new artist, best rap/ sung collaboration, and song of the year that had notable women artists being nominees and the majority.

With this offensive comment hitting the headlines alongside the #MeToo movement happening, it makes me wonder what makes it normalized to subject women to inferior levels. There have been many comments made at or about women for not having what it takes to make it in a certain industry but there is not as much criticism against men. Yes, there are some jobs that men are not the majority in like nursing or teaching, but we do not see someone saying that men are not trying hard enough to succeed in that. Women who are trying to succeed in fields like science, music, or the film industry have been trying for many years. It is not women’s lack of effort but rather there seems to be a bigger thing at holding women back from succeeding. I think that it is because of how history has always viewed/ portrayed women. For centuries, women are having to fight for their place at the head of the table. Women had to fight for their right to vote, women are fighting for their rights to their own bodies, women are fighting for equal pay and many more things. Women are continuously creating movements because they are being put behind men, being put down on the social order, and institutionally shut out. The percentage of women that hold CEO positions is less than 5% based on the American Association of University Women. This number is ridiculously low and begs to ask what is going on in society that has made the women the minority.

 Why is it that women are not seen as capable enough or pushed aside when we have proven in history that we are equally as good if not better. This off hand comment made at women in music is a bigger issue because it is addressing an institutional problem that needs to be faced.  With comments like these made by men that are in influential positions in society, it keeps women subject to being inferior. It keeps women from rising up into higher positions because men already view them as not as good.