2007, Volume 5, Number 1
Op/Ed: Pimpology is Wrong
Op/Ed: Pimpology is Wrongby Timothy Fallis
Our American society has a fondness for taking words and modifying their meanings for popular use. In the last 50 years or so, we’ve accepted “cool” to mean something good and up to date, and “hot” to mean the same thing. We’re accustomed to “cherry” meaning exceptionally fine, and taking “hairy” to not necessarily mean hirsute but to denote something fraught with difficulty. The word “gay” is now rarely used in its original meaning of happy and carefree, but only to refer to homosexuality. One has to be very clear about using the word “bitch” when properly referencing a female dog, it’s become so sadly common to use it to deride a woman; conversely, “bitchin” always denotes something positive. While surely there has been eye-rolling about many such new usages of words, most are taken in stride and end up being used by people of all classes. However, I think a line needs to be drawn about one such term.
Somehow, the term “pimp” has developed a whole new life in the popular diction. “Pimpin’” has become a positive adjective describing a person who is on the cutting edge of style, or to refer to the stylishness of one’s vehicle. “Pimpology” is now used to reference a man’s corpus of knowledge on how to garner sexual favors with the most attractive and popular women. A person can tune into the television network MTV and see a weekly show titled “Pimp My Ride,” which showcases an auto shop’s efforts to turn junker cars into customized dream machines. At the 2002 SEMA auto show in Las Vegas, the aftermarket wheel manufacturer MHT Alloys introduced a wheel that can project color designs and words onto itself; this new innovation was dubbed the “Pimpster.” At the mall recently I saw two young men with t-shirts emblazoned with “Master Pimp,” and one young lady, maybe 15?, wearing a little tank sequined with “Pimpilicious.” There’s a rap artist who styles himself “Pimp Tea.” Kooltones.com advertises a ringtone for cell phones called “pimp,” based on a tune by rapper 50Cent. A quick internet search for music reveals the existence of a genre called “Pimp Rock.” There is even a webzine Pimp Rock Palace (theprp.com) for keeping track of concerts and album releases.
Webster’s defines “pimp” as “a man who solicits for a prostitute or a house of prostitution, and lives off her earnings” or as “a person who lends himself to some corrupt or corrupting activity; Scoundrel”. Wow, that’s what I thought it meant! A pimp is a very bad character, a person who puts women who are desperate and poor to work as whores. Being a pimp is the only occupation I can think of in our society that still institutionalizes slavery; frequently women who try to leave their pimps are beaten, or killed. Pimps sell the bodies of women to be used as impersonal sex objects by whatever slob is willing to pay him a fee, robbing the women of dignity, self-respect and social status. They endanger women’s lives by putting them into submissive situations with men who may become violent, exposing them to sexually transmitted diseases, and frequently offering them solace with narcotics. A pimp is a leech, a criminal, and one of the worst examples of how men abuse and marginalize women.
So, why is the word “pimp” and the lifestyle of a pimp being glamorized by our popular culture? Is it somehow rebellious and liberating to identify with this element, an extension of the “sticking it to the man” mantra of the sixties and seventies? Why be merely rebellious and contrary, when you can take it to the nth degree and idolize an outright criminal? After all, movies don’t portray pimps beating women for not bringing back enough money, or stringing them out on drugs, or housing them in festering flophouses. No, pimps are portrayed as wealthy, popular, handsome men dripping with jewelry, driving expensive cars, and adored by fawning groups of gorgeous, scantily clad women.
I object to this glamorization of a horrible class of person and the sleazy lifestyle he represents. I don’t want young people growing up thinking that it’s cool to wear a t-shirt displaying some permutation of “pimp”, or to idolize celebrities who purport to lead a “pimpin’” lifestyle. I don’t want to turn on my TV and see shows with “pimp” in the title on prime time. Counterculture and rebellion are vital to our society, but a counterculture based on glamorizing the subjugation of women’s bodies is wrong, as wrong as it would be to glamorize slavery or codified racism. I think it would be great if this word went back to just referring to an unmentionable scoundrel and not proudly emblazoned in sequins on the chest of a 15-year-old girl. The fact that people can use the word to refer to something else does not change the fact that it also means Whoremonger; we do a profound disrespect to ourselves and to all women who have been subject to one of these miserable creatures when we use “Pimp” to describe something desirable.
Most of us are not gangsters; we are decent people trying to “live and let live” in society. We are scandalized when we are robbed or victimized by hoodlums, and would be devastated to find that our sister, our daughter, or our classmate had been turned out as a prostitute. None of us are willing to accept quietly the affects of pandering on people we know and love; why then do we allow “pimpin’” the gloss of acceptability we give it when we make it an everyday part of our mainstream culture? By using this term we blithely invite the gutter, the lowest sensibility of society, into our everyday lives, and we shouldn’t. It’s not who we are. It’s not who we want to be. We shouldn’t pretend otherwise.
This paper was written for English 494. The assignment was an op/ed piece on any topic.