Hey did you know that Voice judge Adam Levine was also in a band? Well lest you forget, Maroon 5 just dropped their latest video last night for the track “Girls Like Me,” and it’s the kinda video you’re likely gonna replay over and over for sheer inspirational value.
Featuring women from a variety of backgrounds, industries, and walks of life, Levine and the band pay homage to exactly the kind of girl (or woman, really, but I’m not going to nit-pick that. Grown-ass women friends of mine and I totally talk about “boys we like”) they want to put on a pedestal. Each of the women chosen for the video is someone fierce who, no matter what their industry, has somehow blazed a trail.
They are: Camila Cabello, Tiffany Haddish, Millie Bobby Brown, Gal Gadot Phoebe Robinson, Aly Raisman, Sarah Silverman, Lilly Singh, Amani Al-Khatahtbeh, Trace Lysette, Angy Rivera, Franchesca Ramsey, Ellen DeGeneres, Jennifer Lopez, Chloe Kim, Alex Morgan, Mary J. Blige, Beanie Feldstein, Jackie Fielder, Danica Patrick, Ilhan Omar, Elizabeth Banks, Ashley Graham, and Rita Ora.
I love that the video goes out of its way to be inclusive. You’ll see women of different races and ethnicities, sizes, and gender identities and expressions. The thing about going out of your way to be inclusive, however, is that it makes the instances in which you’re not inclusive all the more glaring, because clearly you were trying. I couldn’t help but notice that there were no visibly disabled women in the video.
Obviously there are invisible disabilities, but in a visual medium like a music video, what we see is of the utmost importance as far as representation. Were Sen. Tammy Duckworth or actress/comedienne Maysoon Zayid not available for a quick shoot? Was anyone like that even approached? (And please correct me if any of the women in the video have a disability of which I’m unaware.)
However, even that didn’t bother me as much as Cardi B being the choice for the rap break on this song, considering her history of transphobic and homophobic comments. Then again, you look deeply enough into any of these women’s catalogs … you know what? I’m just gonna enjoy this vid on its own terms.
The song is catchy as hell, and all the women in it look like they’re having a great time. The best part, of course, is at the end, during which Levine’s wife Behati Prinsloo and their one-year-old daughter Dusty Rose appear. It seems that for all of his history of womanizing, Levine has finally figured out what’s truly valuable in women, whether attached to them romantically or not.
But seriously, though? Get you some disabled women up in your stuff, media!
(via Hello Giggles, featured image: screencap)
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