From “Shave ’Em Dry” to City Girls: Why People Still Fear Black Women’s Pleasure

Sweet·Raw·Sticky- November Series, Part 2 (Read Part 1 Here)

Every time a Black woman drops a pleasure-centered song, Megan, Doja, Trina, City Girls, Sexxy Red, Khia, even back in the day Lil' Kim, the internet suddenly becomes holy.

"Music wasn't like this back in the day."

Yes. It was.

You just weren't listening to the Black women who weren't allowed on your radio.

Then vs Now: It's the same song

Let’s line it up.

• Then: Lucille Bogan – “Shave ’Em Dry” (1935) → “I got somethin’ between my legs…”
  Now: Khia – “My Neck, My Back” / Trina – “Pull Over” / City Girls – “Pussy Talk”
  Same energy: “I enjoy sex and I’m not whispering.”

• Then: Bessie Smith – “Kitchen Man” (1929) → food = sex, woman enjoying it
  Now: Jazmine Sullivan & Ari Lennox – “On It”
  Same energy: “I like what you do to me.”

• Then: Ma Rainey – “Prove It On Me Blues” (1928) → “yeah, I was out with women”
  Now: Kehlani, Janelle Monáe, Young M.A
  Same energy: Queer Black desire has always existed. It was just coded then.

• Then: Blue Lu Barker – “Don’t You Feel My Leg” (1938) → tease + boundary
  Now: Janet – “Any Time, Any Place” or Doja – “Say So”
  Same energy: Sensuality with control.

So if it's the same energy...why is it still controversial in 2025?

1. Because Black Women's pleasure is still seen as a threat

Black Women's sexuality has always been policed first by racism, then by respectability, then by the church, and now by the internet. A Black woman who:

• enjoys sex,
• chooses sex,
• or makes money from sex coded content...

...disrupts the "respectable Black woman" image that some people are still trying to protect.

That's why dirty blues got pushed underground.

That's why City Girls get called "bad for the culture" while men can rap about the exact same thing.

That's why Sexxy Red gets called "ghetto" instead of "in the lineage of Lucille Bogan."

It's not the lyrics. It's who's saying them.

2. Because a lot of us inherited church/purity culture

Here's the part we don't always admit. Some of the shame isn't even ours. We inherited it.

We were raised on:

• "Don't be fast"
• "Good girls don't do that"
• "Your body is a temple"
• "Wait until marriage"

But nobody told us that at the exact same time these messages were circulating, Black women were in juke joints singing about getting pleased. So we grew up thinking sexual freedom was "new" or "worldly"...when actually it's Black and historic.

That tension is what makes people comment things like,

"Music is too nasty now."

No. We just have louder microphones.