Rapper Rick Ross is in the news for publishing a song that contains lyrics in which he appears to be bragging about date rape:
In case you were wondering, “molly” is slang for ecstasy/MDMA, a common date-rape drug.
The song has gathered some negative attention lately, and Reebok is now cutting ties with him for it. Ross has complained that people are misinterpreting the lyric, but hasn’t said exactly what it does mean.
OK, I’m game. Can anyone suggest a more charitable interpretation?
He put molybdenum in her champagne and she didn’t notice its piquant taste?
“Molly” was also the first name of the Secret Service killed in the West Wing when President Bartlet’s daughter was slipped a roofie–I wonder if this nickname (for the drug) was current then.
Never heard the song, and no clue who Rick Ross is, but what about songs like Love Potion #9 or Funky Cold Medina? (Granted neither of those is used properly and they wind up with wacky backfiring results.) Is intending to use a fictional concoction to get your way with someone any better than slipping someone a real date rape drug?
:dubious:
I think he either didn’t want to acknowledge what he said or just wanted it to go away. I saw one article that said Ross had defended himself earlier by simply saying he didn’t use the word rape in the song. So if that’s the gist of it, he didn’t understand the complaint in the first place. The scene is rape whether the uses that word or not. Today I think he put out a longer apology where he apologizes for the whole thing and doesn’t claim it’s anything other than rape. So that’s probably the end of that discussion.
Here’s one (anonymous website) person saying he heard the term long before that. It sounds like an unlikely route to me. But mostly I’m posting to share this tasteless news pun.
Or are you questioning it’s use as a date rape drug?
I have to say that, however offensive his lyrics and stupid his initial response were, the man knows how to apologize.
Or rather his management or the people his management hired to write the apology know how to apologize.
Well, true enough.
I don’t actually know anything about him, not a big fan of the genre.
But you’ve got to admit it’s a nice change from the wishy-washy “that’s not what I meant”, “if anyone was offended” bullshit that’s routinely handed out instead of an actual apology.
I don’t know much about him either.
That’s because he already tried those and they didn’t work. I agree the latest statement is comprehensive and well-written, but when somebody needs that many cracks at an apology, it’s hard to accept his sincerity.
Fair point.
Yes; MDMA seems like a very poor candidate for drug-facilitated sexual assault.
Its users aren’t incapacitated or befuddled, it doesn’t cause “black-outs,” and when you’re dosed with it, it is abundantly clear that you’ve been drugged. Sure, it is a pretty good shortcut to intimacy when everyone is clear what’s going on, but if you were randomly slipped it, then the main reaction is going to be to put your guard waaaay up because* WTF some jerk freaking dosed me* with something speedy.
I don’t think a jury will buy it. And it doesn’t really matter, secretly drugging someone’s drink indicates the intent.
Perhaps the song was a reference to him slipping her some “molly” and then having her get really into the sex, without being fully aware of why? IDK, just a guess…
The point is that you can’t really refer to MDMA as “common date rape drug,” because that’s banana oil; it’s not a substance that would be particularly “useful” in facilitating rape - you can’t lump it in with actual common date-rape drugs like ethanol, GHB, or rohypnol. That makes almost as much sense as referring to Coca-Cola as “a common contraceptive.”
I think Mr. Ross has plenty to answer for in terms of the choice of words, but don’t think the original non-apology was too far off the mark. Look at those lines in context with the rest of the lyrics – nearly every other instance of “You don’t even know it” is unambiguously idiomatic, to be read as “It is superlative, emphatically!” (eg; “This a thousand dollar pair of shoes and you don’t even know it! /This a half a million dollar car, you don’t even know it!”)
The controversial lines can be read the same way, and in fact they make somewhat more sense that way. “Put molly all in her champagne, she ain’t even know it,” can easily be interpreted literally, but then how does “I took her home and I enjoyed that, she ain’t even know it” work? What, she somehow didn’t notice being amped up on E and having a bunch of sex? How is that?
That’s what I was thinking, since, if anything, it would make you more hyper-awake and alert, but also more touchy-feely and aroused/affectionate (I moved this link to a spoiler box since you wouldn’t want it playing with sound at work even though it’s just a fairly tame Family Guy clip):
Is it considered rape if someone slips you a drug and it increases your libido to the point where you say yes when you would otherwise say no?
Okay, I’ll buy that it’s not common.
As for the rest of it, he has a right to put whatever lyrics he wants in a song, but to a lot of people it’s going to sound like he’s saying it’s ok to spike someone’s drink to get laid, and that tells me at best he’s a dumbass for using those lyrics, or worse he really believes it’s okay.
Because she’s either unconscious or so impaired as to be unaware of what is happening to her. I have no idea if these are plausible effect of dosing someone’s drink with “molly” or if this is what Rick Ross intended, but it seems a pretty obvious interpretation of the lines.
According to Wikipedia, MDMA overdose can cause disorientation, hallucinations, cognitive impairment, memory loss, and loss of consciousness, so if that’s what “molly” is then it sounds like it’s at least possible that a woman who’d had her drink spiked with it might afterward not know for sure if she’d been raped.
Wouldn’t think so, but not relevent. MDMA doesn’t do that. If it there was a good libido enhancing drug around, it would be bigger in the market than alcohol, nicotine and viagra.
On the other hand, according to the words, she’s been drinking. Alcohol is a well known date-rape drug, and has been for centuries. I don’t rate it as a good libido enhancing drug though: “It provokes the desire but it takes away the performance”. Traditionally it’s use as a date-rape drug has been to make her too drunk to care, resist, or remember, not to boost her libido.