Lil Nas X Battles Conservative Backlash Over ‘Call Me By Your Name’
The Lil Nas X controversy over the rapper’s latest song and the accompanying music video has conservative critics clutching their pearl rosaries.
Lil Nas X, real name Montero Lamar Hill, exploded into the world’s consciousness with his country rap single Old Town Road in 2019, which gained popularity as the “Yeehaw Challenge” on TikTok before entering the Billboard Hot 100 at #83, which was enough to set off a bidding war to sign him, with Columbia Records ultimately having the winning offer.
Old Town Road went on to have four remixes, the most famous and well known of which was the second, featuring Billy Ray Cyrus which ended up being the longest running number one song on the Billboard 100 after spending 19 weeks in the top spot. Lil Nas X also chose this moment in his career to come out as a gay man, the only artist to ever do so while having a number-one song.
Get ready for more Lil Nas X controversy – he’s just getting started!
And all this before even releasing his official debut album, Montero!
And, if the first single from the album, which is being released in the middle of 2021, is anything to go by, you’d better hold onto your cowboy hats! It’s gonna be a rough ride.
Montero (Call Me By Your Name) was officially released at the beginning of the week, on the same day as the music video and it didn’t take long for the outrage to surface and the predictable cries of ‘won’t somebody think of the children!” to be sounded.
omg if you roll down your window at chic fil a playing call me by your name they give u a free sandwich and a lemonade
— i am reading all that (@LilNasX) March 29, 2021
So the Lil Nas X controversy is not only brought about by the extremely fabulous and queer empowering themes in the music video but also for the fact that towards the end, Lil Nas X slides down a very long stripper pole into hell and gives the devil a lap dance…
I mean, c’mon.
After a year that brought us WAP from Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion in 2020, it only seems fair that young gay fellas might see a version of themselves and gay sexuality that rings a bell of recognition for them – even if that ends in the occasional devilish lap dance.
Twitter game on point
And with his former experience as a savvy social media personality coming into play, it seems he is happy to to do battle on Twitter with his critics, openly responding and none to politely, to the conservative commentators calling him out on the platform…
ur a whole governor and u on here tweeting about some damn shoes. do ur job! https://t.co/qaor6W0B9C
— i am reading all that (@LilNasX) March 28, 2021
LETS FUCKIN GOOOO! WE MADE FOX NEWS! https://t.co/pkEpbcMPqy
— i am reading all that (@LilNasX) March 30, 2021
Montero (Call Me By Your Name), despite the provocative imagery employed in the video, is also a heartfelt tribute to his childhood self, with Lil Nas X confiding in a social media post.
“Dear 14-year-old Montero, I wrote a song with our name in it. It’s about a guy I met last summer. I know we promised to never come out publicly, I know we promised to never be ‘that’ type of gay person, I know we promised to die with the secret, but this will open doors for many other queer people to simply exist.”
— i am reading all that (@LilNasX) March 26, 2021
In another tweet, Lil Nas X did admit that the controversy was taking an emotional toll on him. “I’ll be honest all this backlash is putting an emotional toll on me. i try to cover it with humor but it’s getting hard. my anxiety is higher than ever and stream call me by your name on all platforms now!”
i’ll be honest all this backlash is putting an emotional toll on me. i try to cover it with humor but it’s getting hard. my anxiety is higher than ever and stream call me by your name on all platforms now!
— i am reading all that (@LilNasX) March 29, 2021
And, if you are not one of the over 61 million people to have watched the video since it dropped on Monday, here’s your chance to catch up on what you have been missing!
