Man of Sorrows schreef:
Als je weet dat wereldwijd vier tot vijf keer vaker jonge mannen life struggles hebben die tot een fatale afloop leiden, en onderzoek uitwijst dat sociale normering hierin een zeer belangrijke rol speelt
Ondanks dat ik het met je eens ben dat vrouwen niet overdreven vaak de slachtofferkaart moeten trekken als het gaat om thema's als
mansplaining en
seksisme, vind ik niet dat de songtekst van Lauren Mayberry kwalijk is. Uit haar eigen woorden maak ik op dat de regels niet te letterlijk moet nemen, er schuilt een zekere ironie / tongue-in-cheek onder.
“Like everyone, I’ve had a lot of time to think and reflect over the past year; to examine experiences I had previously glossed over or deeply buried. I feel like I have spent a lot of my life (personally and professionally) performing the uncomfortable balancing act that is expected of women and it gets more confusing and exhausting the older I get. Be successful but only in the way we want you to be. Speak up for yourself but not so loudly that you steal men’s thunder. Be attractive but only for the benefit of men, and certainly don’t be vain. Strive to be The Hot Sad Girl but don’t actually be sad in a way that’s inconvenient for anyone. Be smart but not smart enough to ask for more than what you’re being given…. ‘He Said She Said’ is my way of reckoning with things I’ve accepted that I know I shouldn’t have. Things I pretended weren’t damaging to me. It was the first song we wrote when we started back up, and the opening line (‘He said, You bore me to death’) was the first lyric that came out. All the verse lines are tongue-in-cheek or paraphrased versions of things that have actually been said to me by men in my life. Being a woman is fucking exhausting and it felt better to scream it into a pop song than scream it into the void. After the past year, I think we can all relate to feeling like we’re losing our minds.”