Jennifer Lopez Has a New 'Girl Power' Single Produced by Dr. Luke
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Can you advocate for women's empowerment while working with someone accused of sexual assault? That's the question raised by the release of Jennifer Lopez's new single "Ain't Your Mama," which was produced by Dr. Luke, a man publicly accused of rape by pop-singer Kesha.
On the track, Lopez sings about her refusal to fulfill outdated gender roles in any relationship.
Social media users were quick to point out the alleged conflict.
A song about a modern independent woman produced by someone accused, although not charged, with an alleged sexual assault is complicated. The song poses that a woman like Jennifer Lopez would not want to be with a man who cant take care of himself or get up and work. An independent woman is also someone who makes her own business decisions, and for Jennifer Lopez that might include the decision to work with Dr. Luke.
Lopez's collaboration with Dr. Luke is further complicated by the fact that artists often don't have the freedom to choose which producers they work with, as Kesha herself has learned through her long battle to free herself from her contract with Sony.
Julianne Escobedo Shepherd of The Muse explains:
Of course, the whole crux of this song is “Why don’t you just dump him, dude,” which could of course also be applied to Dr. Luke—but of course, when an artist works with another tarnished artist, we don’t always know what’s going on behind the scenes; J. Lo could potentially have refused to work with him, yet this song dropped on Epic Records, a Sony imprint. As Tinashe reminded us when she revealed publicly that it wasn’t her choice to work with Chris Brown, label executives can theoretically coerce an artist into working with people they don’t necessarily like or respect simply by rights of what’s in a contract, and of course in these cases, it’s all about the bottom line.
