#Nonprofit rips Grammys for ‘glamorizing prostitution and stripping’

The Grammys were an objectifying moral disgrace, according to this anti-sexploitation group. 

The National Center on Sexual Exploitation has released a statement ripping the 2021 Grammys for including Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion’s X-rated pole-dancing performance.

“The National Center on Sexual Exploitation (NCOSE) says the CBS Grammys broadcast contributed to the sexual exploitation of women by glamorizing prostitution and stripping,” the anti-porn group wrote in its Monday release. “The performance by Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion showed the two women and backup performers wearing thongs and lingerie, dancing on a stripper pole, and crawling around and twerking on a bed together.” 

The group, which describes itself as a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization, was founded in 1962 and leads the fight to expose “the links between all forms of sexual abuse and exploitation,” including child sexual abuse, the public health harms of pornography and sexual objectification, according to its website.

The awards show, the statement continues, was a better fit for the cutting room floor of an adult-film studio than national television.

“In a performance that could have been cut from a hardcore pornography film, CBS allowed a glamorization of stripping and prostitution to be broadcast in front of a national audience — a portion of which were children — for no other reason than for TV ratings,” the center’s senior vice president and executive director Dawn Hawkins said. “Despite the ‘popularity’ of the song performed by Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion, CBS should have never allowed this kind of explicit performance to happen at the Grammys.”

Prostitution and stripping are “never empowering for women,” Hawkins goes on, arguing that the two only ever serve to “set up systems that exploit and oppress” the female-bodied.

Although Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion’s “WAP” performance did inspire an immense amount of media coverage, it was not, in fact, able to score the Grammys good TV ratings: The award show’s ratings tanked this year, possibly to a record low. Early ratings from Nielsen have the awards drawing a measly 7.9 million total viewers, although the numbers are expected to climb incrementally when adjustments are made for time zones.