Falling for you- Jaden
- 26090069
- Dec 10, 2022
- 1 min read
Jaden Smith has been known as Will Smith’s son, Kylie Jenner’s boyfriend, and the guy who wanted to talk about the “political and economic state of the world” but nobody recognizes him for the toxic singer that he may be.
Jaden released a song called “Falling for you” on his album CTV3: Cool Tape Vol.3. On this song he quoted the lyrics:
“I think I'm falling for you (Falling for you)
I think I'm falling for you (Falling for you)
If you don't call me, I'll jump off the roof (Don't let me down)
If you don't call me, I'll jump off the roof (Hey, I'm 'bout to lose it)”
These lyrics are extremely toxic and problematic because they romanticize suicide and self-harm. When people especially teenagers listen to such songs, they adopt these notions from the music that they are consuming. Most young adult relationships become emotionally abusive and partners threaten to hurt themselves if their significant other is about to leave them. They do this to make sure that the other person stays with them and takes advantage of their vulnerability. This song promotes similar sentiments in teens and even adults. It’s very toxic of Jaden to write such lyrics because even if he didn’t mean it, he glorified emotional abuse and might encourage others to behave this way. This is why songwriters such as him should be more careful with the content they put out there and be mindful of their audiences when releasing songs.
This reminds me of a scene from one of our Pakistani movies "Punjab Nahi Jaungi", where the heroine, played by Mehwish Hayat, listens to her husband's, played by Humayun Saeed, problematic conversation with his friends hence she threatens to leave him. As she walks away, her husband jumps off the building. This scene is followed by the wife looking after her husband who now has a few fractured bones and later she falls in love with him. This highlights how men use suicide to force women to stay in relationship even when they want to leave.
We often fail to realise the impact of music on perpetuating certain norms. Songs consist of lyrics, which at the end of the day are words that artists are communicating to the public that listens. There was another blog about misogynistic rap, and I've always tried to be cognisant of the music that I consume. Jaden's song reminds me of Eminem's Love the Way You Lie. It was a song so widely acclaimed, that him and Rihanna came out with a Part 2. I learned the rap and I still know all the words to it, but when you take a second and actually listen to what he is saying, you wouldn't still love the way he lies. For example,…
Language is an important aspect of representation and it portrays certain narrative. The lyrics that Jaden Smith has written shows how he’s ready to emotionally manipulate others into staying with him. This promotes toxic masculinity in a way, where the singer/writer of the song is blackmailing his love to call him because he’s in love with her. This is a portrayal similar to what Pakistani dramas show too: men will never take no for an answer, and do the worst things on their extent to get what they want—if this isn’t a toxic trait, then I don’t know what is. However, the lyrics mentioned in the blog are the only problematic part of the song. The way media influences the…
Romanticising suicide coupled with blackmailing your partner is one toxic theme we get to see in many other songs be it bollywood or Hollywood pop, which I believe isn’t discussed much. Its great how you’ve identified the dilemma through this song of Jaden Smith. Blackmailing the other person through such words is basically emotionally manipulating the other person to feel pity for you. Many people hence fall in the trap of such toxic people and suffer for years. This is equal to harassing or gaslighting the other person probing them to talk or else they will kill themselves. The toxic person is directly putting the blame on the person they have fallen and making them feel wrongly guilty which is…