The Real Frank Ocean

Hip-hop musician Frank Ocean, who came out last week, performed his song 'Bad Religion' on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon:



Sorry we haven't covered this. I'm sure I had intended to. If you have a little time, use it to read Ocean's letter, which in many ways negates the language that has been used to describe his so-called 'coming out'. The notion of coming out doesn't quite fit here, though; I don't know why.

Michael Jeffries highlighted the significance of this confession in terms of his hip-hop stardom:

So even though Ocean is not a rapper, the impact of the letter echoes throughout hip-hop, which has a history of casual and vicious homophobia among its most commercially successful artists (and many fans). As DJ and hip-hop journalist Davey D points out, this history includes repeated attempts to erase and forget LGBT hip-hop artists. But beyond that erasure, bigoted notions of manliness permeate hip-hop. Rappers persist in using homophobic slurs and descriptions of gay sex acts as lyrical weapons for demeaning opponents and critics. And when same-gender-loving women are discussed by men in hip-hop, it's usually as part of the man's spectacular descriptions of his own sexual conquests and fantasies.

The lyrics to the embedded song here.