Kanye Kendrick lookalike wannabe GGgggrrrrrrr, via theroot.com

I need to make a confession: I love the song “Loyal.” I’m thrilled every time it comes on the radio, and I don’t have to pay Chris Brown to hear it. It tastes like candy in my ear holes. I just want to listen to it on repeat, its ringtone rhythms pouring sugar down my spine. 

I try to feed my addiction by listening to these ladiez’ remixes of “Loyal” instead, but it doesn’t feed the beast. What should I do? Go cold turkey? It may be the only hope I have.

Okay, okay, so “Loyal” is no “The Red Carpet,” which sounds like rare steak with a perfect burnt peppery crispness, or “Bound 2,” which is like a tiny bite of caviar. No, “Loyal” is like that first sip of Coca-Cola after a long day. Sure, it’s bad for you–it will kill you, actually–actually it’s toxic for the whole community–but it is custom engineered to be smooth, light on the palate, addictive, and delicious. And anyway, Beyonce likes it (or at least the music industry still does).

In the last few years we’ve learned an enormous amount about how Big Food operates, from how Doritos’s addictiveness is perfected in focus groups to how Coke pays the NAACP to keep its voice down about soda’s ravages in communities of color. So here’s my beef: who’s the muscle behind these misogynistic singles? How come a catchy beat like Nic Nac’s gets penned up with woman-hating lyrics and sent over to the woman-beater to perform? I want to know. Where does the buck stop for a rapey song like “How Many Drinks,” or for “Blurred Lines”–let alone Robin Thicke’s stalker manifesto of a new album? Who greenlights this shit?

We’ve all seen Food, Inc. Well, now I’m ready for Music, Inc.