Defending Macklemore (and why all of us, gay or straight, have to look out for each other)

Perusing Facebook as I often do, I came across the following headline, posted by one of the NYC music pages that I follow:

Le1f just blasted Macklemore for "Same Love" 

I had no idea who Le1f was, but the notion that someone was "blasting" a song about legalizing gay marriage certainly got my attention. I assumed Le1f was one of the many sad people out there who think homosexuality is a sin because it says so in the Bible, right there with women daring to open their mouths in places of worship ("Let your women keep silence in the churches, for it is not permitted unto them to speak" - 1 Corinthians) or, um, the bulk of American eating habits ("The eating of fat is prohibited forever" - Leviticus).

I clicked the link and was pretty surprised to learn that Le1f isn't shitting all over Macklemore because he hates gay people - he's doing it because he IS gay and how dare a straight guy make money off someone else's issues?! He's also pissed because Macklemore didn't donate any of the proceeds from Same Love to pro-LGBT charities.

 Photo via

Before I really get down to it, let's address some of the more minor issues that arise here.

1) Macklemore and Ryan Lewis aren't signed with a major label and release all their music independently. While they certainly have a ton of money at this point, artists who voluntarily choose to forgo big name representation are probably at least slightly less in it for the money than others. Maybe he thinks that they wrote this song with the express purpose of making money off it, but I'm not convinced.

2) I did some googling and discovered that Le1f thinks Macklemore and Ryan Lewis ripped off his song Wut in their song, Thrift Shop. I assume you're all familiar with Thrift Shop, so here's Wut, for comparison:



There's a pretty strong horn section here. Just like in Thrift Shop. Are they similar? Sure. The same? No. Is there a rich history of sampling other people's songs in rap music that dates back to the beginning of rap itself so even if Thrift Shop did directly sample Wut it would be totally normal? Yes. Know your roots, Le1f.

3) A day after I originally published this post, I learned from a friend of Lacey's that Macklemore did, in fact, donate some of the proceeds from Same Love to Washington United for Marriage. So that point is totally bunk.

And now, on to the good stuff.

Though my immediate, visceral reaction to reading this slew of hateful tweets (all of which Le1f has since deleted) was one of disgust, I tried to put myself in his shoes before even entertaining the idea of writing this blog post.

As a woman, what I can or cannot do with my own body is a subject of national debate. What if a man, lacking a uterus, came out with a pro-choice rap song? What if he gave not even a single penny from his profits to Planned Parenthood? Would this anger me?

No, no it would not. In fact, it would be make me pretty damn happy. Sure, money to Planned Parenthood would be great, but so is verbal support and awareness. Because we don't live in the kind of society where it's perfectly acceptable to throw your hands up and yell, "NOT MY PROBLEM, SUCKA" when we witness injustices happening around us but not to us. Change will never happen if we only look after ourselves and don't stand up for our fellow man (or woman!). So if a man wants to champion a woman's right to choose even if he is not now, and will never be, a woman? High five, brotha. Happy to have you in my corner. I certainly don't have any poll results to draw from, but I would imagine that there are lots of gay men and women out there who are overjoyed to have a celebrity straight ally in Macklemore. Look at Lady Gaga - some people love her for the music and the meat dress. Some love her for the LGBT activism.

Furthermore, the issue of gay marriage represents so much more than giving people some legal rights (albeit very very important and meaningful ones). It's an issue of equality, and equality is EVERYONE'S problem. And while many of us have been fortunate enough to have never been discriminated against in our lifetimes, it doesn't mean that no one in our situation ever has. Identifying as a Jewish person certainly has different ramifications for me than it did for my grandparents. Am I allowed to just sit back and relax now that I live in a place where being Jewish is totally acceptable, even though not every minority group is quite so comfortable? The short answer: no.

My wholly unsolicited advice to Le1f would be as follows: stop hating on people who are trying to help you. Promoting a message of equality, especially through such a stereotypically un-LGBT-friendly medium as rap music, is never a bad thing.