Getty
Getty
The fallout from the NFL’s domestic abuse scandal from earlier this season has clearly reverberated well beyond sports.  In many instances, that’s been a positive, opening a dialogue on ways to prevent violence against women, examining root causes and encouraging victims to speak out about their experiences.
This is not one of those moments.
Rapper Eminem, in a lengthy freestyle recently released as part of a hip-hop cypher promoting an upcoming greatest hits compilation for his Shady Records label, invoked the Ray Rice incident in one of the verses.
“But I may fight for gay rights, especially if the [expletive] is more of a knockout than Janay Rice/ Play nice? [Expletive] I’ll punch Lana Del Rey right in the face twice, like Ray Rice in broad daylight in the plain sight of the elevator surveillance/ ’Til her head is banging on the railing, then celebrate with the Ravens.”
It’s not exactly a departure from form, as the legendary rapper has always peppered his incredible flow with pop culture references intended to garner the most shock. In this case, he uses the Rice incident to fantasize violence on pop singer Lana Del Rey, who joins Moby, former *NSync member Chris Kirkpatrick, Britney Spears and countless others on Em’s career list of verbal targets.
Lana Del Rey performs at Coachella earlier this year. (Photo by Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP)
Lana Del Rey performs at Coachella earlier this year.
(Photo by Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP)
There’s a brief attempt to justify the nihilistic content before the Del Rey/Rice verse, alluding to the obvious financial incentive that comes with continuing the Slim Shady alter ego he’s been parading for nearly two decades. He continues skewing familiar targets, even referring to current Disney performers with a gay slur.
That’s pathetic.
As this video shows, Marshall Mathers’ flow continues to be as skillful in his forties as any rapper half his age. His ability to string full sentences into bars where they simply shouldn’t fit has always been masterful, which is why it’s ridiculous that he reverts to such juvenile imagery here, improvised freestyle or not.
You can listen to the track, which contains explicit and homophobic lyrics, on YouTube. 
It’s not like he’s the first musician (or filmmaker or comic book artist for that matter) to glamorize ugly fantasies in his art, but while the homophobia and misogynistic content might have been somewhat more understandable coming from an aspiring 24-year-old kid from a poor Detroit neighborhood in the late 1990s, the only shocking part of it now is how anachronistic those sentiments are in 2014.
In a seven-minute cypher that flows all over the place, it’s possible that half of Eminem’s lines were tossed off the top of the head without much thought beyond what came out at that very moment. And while his lyrical threats of violence have always seemed more based in cartoonish rap bravado than reality, it’s an ugly message to send in any climate, but especially today’s.
If any good has come from an increased spotlight on the Ray Rice incident, it’s an increased awareness that there are countless ones like it that are never captured on film and happen to victims throughout all reaches of society. It’s certainly contributed to a more proactive attitude against such violence from famous faces both inside the NFL and outside of it.
Rather than follow the path of artists like the Beastie Boys, who famously distanced themselves from the jokey misogyny of their Licensed to Ill album eight years later on Ill Communication, Eminem seems to be doubling down, a bizarre strategy for a 42-year-old father of a college-aged daughter.
People and times change, and there’s a way to mature as an artist gracefully. Eminem, talented as he still is, doesn’t seem to get that.