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Lil Nas X seems to explicitly evoke a very similar tradition in Black American music. Observers and participants in the ritual are provoked by the ritual to reflect upon the true nature of evil. This performance mocks the demonizing language and actions of the colonists. The former represents the slaves and the latter their European masters. To this day, many citizens of Panama, who trace their cultural heritage to these enslaved people, critique this language as they memorialize the famous slave rebellion that earned their freedom.Īround the time of Easter, they dramatize the rebellion while wearing costumes as angels and demons. According to ethnographer Renée Alexander Craft, European colonists scared enslaved persons into submission by claiming that the devil would harm them if they rebelled. In Panama, for example, some people engage in annual rituals that turn the tables on the Spanish colonists’ use of “evil” to suppress rebellion. Just as the history of Christianity is punctuated with the demonizing of numerous groups, so too is there a tradition of victims creatively rejecting and mocking such demonization. It instead should be understood in the context of marginalized peoples parodying demonizing rhetoric. However, these interpretations, I believe, misread the video. As religion scholar Anthea Butler points out, the film pushes “every button that … conservative Christians have.” Some conservative Christians see the video as a celebration of evil and implicit promotion of Satanism. He then swiftly kills Satan and dons his horns. Once in hell, Lil Nas X gives the devil an energetic lap dance. As comments on Twitter and YouTube point out, Lil Nas X defiantly goes exactly where he was always told he would end up. In the middle section, Lil Nas X is executed – ostensibly as a queer martyr – after which he pole dances to hell. The video takes place in three acts, bookended by a seduction of Lil Nas X in the Garden of Eden and a dance with the devil in the underworld. Throughout the video, Lil Nas X explores what it means to celebrate his identity and desires. The video evokes an impressive number of religious and classical motifs that intersect with questions of queer identity, marginalization and religion. However, it also includes biblical references in the lyrics – such as the line “If Eve ain’t in your garden” – alongside more explicit references to gay sex. The song “Montero” comes across, at first, as a straightforward expression of sexual and romantic desire. Some contemporary Christian communities, for example, perceive homosexuality to be demon possession and seek remediation through violent and psychologically terrifying exorcisms. These associations continue to inform Christian belief and practice today.
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Demons regularly and intentionally appear in the form of Black bodies throughout Christian traditions, and Black persons are also regularly associated with sinful sexuality, influenced by Greco-Roman beliefs that people with dark skin were “hypersexual.” In Christian art, literature, and spirituality, beliefs in evil spiritual beings have informed, and been informed by, xenophobia and antipathy toward particular groups.īlackness and what is considered to be “deviant” sexuality are frequently demonized in Christian history.
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It also speaks to Western Christianity’s long tradition of demonizing queer, Black, Jewish, Indigenous and other people. Lil Nas X’s experience mirrors that of many LGBTQ people who grew up in conservative religious households. As a young Christian boy, he was conflicted over his sexuality and wondered if it meant he was beyond redemption and damned to hell. The story he tells of his early life as a gay teen is, sadly, all too familiar. Lil Nas X publicly came out as queer in 2019. His breakthrough hit “Old Town Road,” received as a crossover between country and rap, unleashed the specter of racism within the institutions of country music. Montero Lamar Hill, known artistically as Lil Nas X, is no stranger to disrupting restrictive categories. Despite the temptation to interpret the video as a flashpoint in culture wars between religious conservatives and the LGBTQ community, “Montero” is, I believe, best understood by comparing it with other creative works by demonized peoples that critique, mock and reject societal misconceptions about what is truly evil.