The Star News had carried a piece on the issue as well:
Recording artiste Barbee recently premiered an explosive video for her new single, 'Babylon', which sees her pushing sexual limits. In the video, Barbee is seen engaging in a sexual romp with a female in a steam room.
Barbee said she was at ease with the video, and felt empowered and confident to share the "truth" with her fans. She also reiterated that, as a woman in the industry, she would not like her intellect to be negated based on the video concept.
"Life begins at the end of your comfort zone," she said.
Crowned 'Reggae Pop Princess' by talk show diva Wendy Williams, the recording artiste and songwriter is fresh off her European and Australian tour.
No stranger to the Jamaican musical landscape, Barbee first emerged working with artistes such as Junior Kelly, with whom she recorded the hit single Missing You. The song received airplay in the Caribbean and overseas, and reached number one on Jamaican charts.
Barbee's other popular recordings include Paddy Cake and Give It Up, collaborations with dancehall icon Beenie Man. She followed up with successful records, Love You Anyway and Feel So Good.
Barbee said she is ready to carry her love for music to new horizons and is working with Grammy award-nominated producers The Exclusives and the island duo, Rock City, who penned the megahit, Man Down, for Rihanna.
She continues to book shows worldwide, recording in Los Angeles, Atlanta and Jamaica. Barbee will also be launching her line of studio-quality headphones, Barbee Everting Pretty Headphones, which will be released soon.
ENDS
Fast forward to recent times and the comment thread in several dancehall groups and social media are still raging surprisingly; this one has not gone down as another nine day wonder as Stylysh and Ishawna's sujourn into public displays of affection experiment went and then it essentially died down after a while with both artistes benefiting in the long run it seems.
see:
We're not lesbians - Stylysh clarifies song with Ishawna .......... And So What if They Were?
Dancehall Act Stylysh says Lesbians Linked her on Instagram after Secret Lovers' Song Controversy meanwhile the comments have been scaving such as:
"a weh some sodomite gal nuh gwey wid dem nastiness ...... "
"a dis dem wan promote inna dancehall now ....... suck pussy oman"
"dem gal yah fi dead like dem battyman fren dem .........."
And so on some of which are too ghastly to share here but it just goes to show the level of hate embedded in the national psyche and all one needs is a story or event to reignite same. Whether the sojourn is a way to get more attention that may translate into sales in a slumpy music market is not clear to me or is it a genuine openness for same gender love is not open; lesbians overall have had a more tolerant response nationally than us their male counterparts and the strongest evidence of this is in the adult entertainment industry.
Strip clubs since the late nineties mostly have been offering sometimes live on stage sex between women with added features such as Heineken content poured into vaginal orifices and such or dildos/strap-ons used in the act; the use of toys however reinforces the stereotype of SGL practicing women (gay or not) as looking for an alternative from non performing men who cannot get said women aroused (so they fake it) as a result women switch to each other, in essence an almost granted permission so conditional tolerance. In a sense the live sex scenes has helped in HIV prevention strategies on the ground in terms of condom usage displays and safer sex drawing from recent memory when myself and my team in my HIV work years asked models to play their part after some training so as to bring a real world experience to the work.
Changing hearts and minds is so urgent these days for any credibility to emerge and to strengthen advocacy's call but with recent episodes of elitism showing up its ugly head parading as concerns for governmental non intervention again I am not so sure right now. See: Jaevion Nelson: PM Must Find Alternate Ways To Support LGBT Community (Gleaner Nov 2015)
flashback: Jamaican Homosexuality & Class Issues 2009
flashback: Jamaican Homosexuality & Class Issues 2009
Peace & tolerance
H
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