All day Thursday, I managed to avoid watching and listening to Justin Timberlake’s second single and music video, “Supplies,” off of his latest album, Man of the Woods. I didn’t think it would be that big of a deal – I didn’t completely hate his first single and I thought the video was stupid, but whatever. “Supplies” though… it’s next-level stupidity. It’s actually boomerang stupidity for Justin because he’s opening himself up to a lot of sh-t. He’s opening himself up to a lot of questions that he is incapable of answering. Here’s the video:
I could only get about a minute into this before I gave up, quite honestly. You know what this reminded of in a weird way? Beyonce’s “Formation” video when she made all of those visual references to Katrina, Black Lives Matter and slavery. Beyonce came at those subjects as a black woman who cares deeply about the issues she was referencing – I still get choked up thinking about the “Stop Shooting Us” graffiti – and she backs that up with words and deeds. And for all of that, she was called “militant” and a “Black Panther” and criticized by dozens of prominent white politicians and media figures. But when Justin Timberlake literally breezes by those issues, all anyone can say is “it’s funny that he’s trying to be woke.”
Obviously, Timberlake is trying to have his cake and eat it too. He wants to get credit for being woke enough to include imagery of #MeToo, BLM, Harvey Weinstein, etc, but he doesn’t actually have anything meaningful to say about any of those subjects, and obviously he’s not backing any of this up with any kind of actions. So, basically, he’s just using the movements started by victimized people for his image. He, as a white man, is using people of color and sexual assault victims for his image. As Kathleen at LaineyGossip noted, “This video is essentially JT’s version of the Kendall Jenner Pepsi ad.”
Some sites are calling him out on it – The Independent: “Woke up, sheeple, Justin Timberlake just dropped ‘Supplies’, the worst music video of 2018 so far.” And HuffPo: “Justin Timberlake Tries To Convince You He’s Woke In ‘Supplies’ Music Video.”
Photos courtesy of WENN.
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