The song I have chosen to analyze is “Janie’s Got A Gun,” written by Aerosmith, and released as a hit single on November 8th, 1989. This is an extremely controversial song, especially taking into consideration the time in which it was released. This hit song quickly ranked top four on the “Hot 100”, and the music video for the song went into heavy rotation on MTV. This song goes into extreme depth on a severe case of sexual harassment that rapidly escalates to an alarming level. This revolting case involves incest, molestation, rape, severe violence, and much more. This song deals with one of the numerous extents that sexual harassment can reach. This severe problem has drastically affected people of all cultures, ages, genders, social classes, sexualities, and racial distinctions. Many artists from varying mediums revolve their art around this broad subject and the extent it can reach. This issue is of vital relevance to society, and it deserves to be analyzed and have its resulting societal effects explored in depth.
This song discusses a young female who reaches an emotional breaking point and shoots her biological father after years of continuously enduring sexual harassment, molestation, rape, and severe violence. Janie’s father’s immoral, lewd, and repulsive actions are exposed in the line, “He jacked a little, bitty baby. The man has got to be insane” (Aerosmith). This line leads us to believe that Janie’s father began to sexually assault her when she was just a baby and continued to do so throughout the remainder of her childhood. This line was originally written as, “He raped a little, bitty baby” (Aerosmith). According to extensive research, Steven Tyler altered the verse due to the request of John Kalodner. John Kalodner was an executive at Aerosmith’s record company that assisted Aerosmith with better meeting commercial interests. Kalodner was under the impression that radio stations would avoid playing the song on their channel if it was too controversial or too graphic.
Incest is by no means openly discussed as a comfortable subject in society. I guarantee all of you have heard the various widespread West Virginia or Alabama incest “jokes” and stereotyping. Incest occurs regularly and is frequently treated as a laughing matter, but it is not. Many sexually abused victims find it uncomfortable and frightening to come forward with their emotional and physical trauma out of fear of becoming the butt of a vulgar joke. Unfortunately, various forms of abuse were commonly considered an accepted behavior in society for many years and often went unreported and unaddressed. While new awareness of this issue has potentially made this a less accepted behavior today, abuse is not only still often overlooked by society but also by both the abuser and the victim. Family members of the victim are often aware of the incest but prefer to keep the shame of the sexual abuse private and inside the family instead of broadcasting it for the whole world to see. For example, in the music video listed above, it is made apparent that Janie does have a mother. It is assumed that Janie’s mother was aware of the sexual abuse inflicted upon her daughter but remained silent out of fear of facing the truth. The mother wanted it to stay a “private matter.” Janie felt that no one believed her and that no one ever would, so she took matters into her own two hands the best way she knew how in an attempt to end her suffering. Janie turned to revenge for resolve, which resulted in her abusive father’s ultimate demise. After being arrested for the murder of her father, the shocking truth about her abusive childhood was publicly revealed.
The message of this song has an extremely deep underlying meaning. It discusses a very controversial issue that severely impacts the victim as well as society as a whole. Abusers are an extreme burden on their victims, bystanders, and on society in general. The lyrics of this song give the listener an internal glimpse of the emotional torment and trauma personally endured by Janie. Society tends to place the blame of the abuse on the victim, shaming them, rather than rightfully blaming the abuser. However, in this song, the blame is placed entirely on Janie’s father, the abuser. The song lyrics encourage us to sympathize with Janie, the victim, instead of blaming her. This is illustrated in the line, “What did her daddy do, what did he put her through” (Aerosmith). In my opinion, it seems that society would rather blame the innocent than to seek the truth.
Rolling Stone. “Readers Poll: The 10 Best Aerosmith Songs of All Time.” Rolling Stone, 25 June 2018, http://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/readers-poll-the-10-best-aerosmith-songs-of-all-time-21418/7-mama-kin-26859/.
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I had never heard this song before and it was interesting to read about. I really don’t hear about or even think about incest very often, but I can definitely acknowledge that it is generally negative. I didn’t realize that it was still quite so big a problem, though. The part of this post that stuck with me the most was how you mentioned that the victims are often blamed. I think about this concept in relation to a whole lot of topics, but not incest. I suppose it makes sense that it would be no different here than anywhere.
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Wow, this was quite the topic! This is a very sad story and I don’t know much but what is stated, I hope Janie didn’t serve a full sentence. It is very sad that this was the reality for a lot of little boys and girls. creating a song was a unique way to bring attention to this situation.
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I also have never heard this song before, but after listening to it for the very first time this topic is indeed one of those topics that aren’t talked about very much… it’s all kept pretty quite. I definitely didn’t know much about incest. let alone that it was something that was still going on and I commend you for shedding light on this topic because this is only the beginning. Great work!
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