Unholy Anthems: Queer Pop Music as Critique of American Christianity

Abstract

LGBTQ musicians Lil Nas X and Sam Smith have both released songs and music videos in recent years which have proved quite controversial for their use of Christian iconography, garnering strong reactions from leaders of the U.S. Christian Evangelical right. This thesis will analyze these works as products of the years following President Trump’s first term and seek to explore why these particular songs evoked such a strong reaction. To do so, the analysis relies on frameworks of queer theory and intersectionality to explore how these cultural products of queer art threaten the hegemony of Puritan sexual values in American culture. The songs and music videos discussed challenge and critique the roles marginalized identities play in the performance of Evangelicals’ values of sexual purity and morality. Analyzing the backlash and response to these songs will show that conservative critics’ general accusations of blasphemy and obscenity obfuscate the intended messages of these artists seeking to critique the structural racism and homophobia of American Evangelicalism. By focusing the public controversy on the shock value of obscenity and sacrilegious imagery, these criticisms illuminate Evangelicals’ individualistic view of sin and their dismissal of social or structural sin. To further contextualize the impact of these two contemporary examples, they will be considered in comparison to Madonna, another artist whose LGBTQ themes in her music drew criticism from the Evangelical right in the 1980s and 1990s. The first chapter will focus on Madonna’s portrayals of religious and sexual ecstasy as well as race, specifically in “Like a Prayer” and “Vogue.” The second chapter will consider Lil Nas X’s “MONTERO (Call Me By Your Name)” and the Biblical vision of queer utopia he creates in its music video. Finally, the third chapter will consider Sam Smith and Kim Petras’s “Unholy” and its performance of Satan, adultery, and queer and trans sexuality.