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We’re Having the Wrong Conversation About Sam Smith’s Satan Outfit

We're Having the Wrong Conversation About Sam Smith's Satan Outfit

Shock and rock have tangoed together since at least as far back as Elvis Presley. And once again, we collectively witnessed popular music’s propensity to stoke controversy by appropriating religious imagery Sunday night at the Grammy Awards.

I’m talking about Sam Smith and Kim Petras’ performance of their hit song “Unholy,” of course. The pair took home the coveted Grammy for this song in the category of Best Pop Duo/Group Performance.

In the live show, Smith donned a red top hat with horns, along with a blazing red outfit, visuals marking  him as Satan—a role Smith obviously relished. And the internet lost its collective mind, with some gushing about Smith and Petras’ deliberately “transgressive” schtick and others expressing outrage that something seemingly close to Satan worship was transpiring onstage at the biggest music awards show on Earth.

But I think we have deeper issues to explore in the blood-red glare of Smith’s satanic extravaganza.

First up, in the most literal sense, I agree that Smith’s donning a costume mimicking Satan as he pranced around menacingly felt spiritually creepy. No doubt about that. Add in Kim Petras (whose participation in the song as the first transgendered person to win a Grammy is something I’ll get to momentarily) writhing in a cage, and the whole thing smacked of a horror movie mixed up with a bondage video.

Still, we need to look at where Sam Smith has come from and at least ask the question of what he’s trying to accomplish.

Before this album, Smith was known for being a gay man singing sad, earnest, heartbreaking songs about not finding love. He wasn’t someone I’d have pegged as “Most Likely to Use Satan” in his next performance. But I suspect that Smith realized he’d reached the ceiling with his melancholy approach to music. To go to the next level, you need something shocking. Something titillating. Something sexy. The song “Unholy” goes to that place. The racy, gender-blurring video goes further. And this performance goes further still.

We can never know someone’s heart motivations, of course. I know that. But it sure seems like Sam Smith is walking a well-worn path here, one that the Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, The Eagles, Ozzy Osbourne, Slayer, Marilyn Manson and so many others have either walked or been accused of walking.

 Yes, appropriating satanic imagery is disturbing. But when we as Christians clutch our proverbial pearls like Dana Carvey’s “Church Lady” from the ‘80s on SNL, I think we play right into the response Smith and others hope for. It’s almost as if Smith and his creative team said, “Let’s make the Christians lose their minds.” And right on cue, we do. I don’t think it serves us well when our knee-jerk outrage exemplifies that stereotype.

The bigger story, I think, than Smith’s Satan getup is the overall worldview his song, video and performance espouse.

The song itself focuses on a married man who secretly goes to a “body shop” to do “unholy” sexual things there. But if you’re expecting the song to deliver some kind of cautionary note about this behavior, other than labeling it “Unholy,” it doesn’t. If anything, the lyrics embrace an admiration for a man who can get away with such cheating to meet his “needs.”

Couple that with gender-bending imagery in a video featuring every expression of male and female and transsexual under the sun, and the message is loud and clear: Sex is good. Any kind. Any way. It’s all up to you.

That message is arguably reinforced further by the participation of Kim Petras, born Tim Petras, here, who during the awards show became the first transsexual artist to receive a Grammy. The audience roared its approval during Petras’ acceptance speech during the show.

So even as we’re fussing about Smith’s Satan costume, I believe there’s a more diabolical sleight of hand happening here: We might just be missing the need to have a deeper conversation about how Smith’s song and imagery subverts a Christian understanding of the purpose and place of sexuality. And Smith knows it: It’s right there in the song’s title, “Unholy.”

That, I believe, is the conversation we need to be having with our kids, helping them to think clearly about how God has designed sex, what He intended by it and how Satan has for millennia distorted and degraded this beautiful and good expression of our creation in God’s image.

adam-holz
Adam R. Holz

After serving as an associate editor at NavPress’ Discipleship Journal and consulting editor for Current Thoughts and Trends, Adam now oversees the editing and publishing of Plugged In’s reviews as the site’s director. He and his wife, Jennifer, have three children. In their free time, the Holzes enjoy playing games, a variety of musical instruments, swimming and … watching movies.

19 Responses

  1. -Thank you for writing this article. It makes a lot of excellent points. First, complaining to the company that produces goods or services you dislike never does any good. At best, they’ll dismiss you as an armchair quarterback who wants to see them crash and burn. At worst, they’ll be encouraged to continue because they’re ornery people who enjoy getting others all riled up because doing so makes them feel good about themselves. Also, if one company stops producing a highly desired good or service, some other company will rush to fill in the gap.

    Second, if you want to make a good or service disappear, you need to make the market for that good or service disappear. Or if you don’t care about the rest of the world but you do care about your kids, take steps to make sure your kids aren’t in the market for goods and services that you object to. I’m going to give you a few examples.

    Today’s public schools are more concerned about keeping teachers happy and keeping parents in the dark than they are with educating kids. We’ve seen the consequences of that in Cincinnati, Ohio. Eight year-old Gabriel Taye was relentlessly bullied, and the school did nothing about it, nor did they notify his mother. Worse, when they had indisputable video evidence of him being punched in a bathroom and knocked unconscious, they took him to the nurse’s office, and that nurse flat-out lied to the boy’s mother and told them that he fainted. I will never understand why they did not tell that boy’s mother what really happened or why the school did not show the mother the video footage that proved he was being bullied. Sadly, that boy ended up committing suicide. If we got rid of all public schools and replaced them with a mixture of private schools and/or homeschooling, the market for the TV series “13 Reasons Why” would disappear.

    Too many people do not how to handle stress. Their anger builds up and builds up inside of them and they feel the only way to deal with their anger is to vent it. If more people knew appropriate ways to deal with anger and frustration, there would be less of a market for first-person shooter games.

    Too many parents do not let their socialize in person very much. If our communities were safer and people knew their neighbors better, there would be a less of a market for Facebook and other social networking sites.

    Too many kids are ornery and enjoy making their parents or other people mad because doing so makes them feel good about themselves. If your kids are not ornery, they would not be swayed by the marketing campaign for “Dead Space 2” claiming that “Your mom hates this.”

    Let’s change our strategy. Let’s stop trying to sway companies that makes goods and services we don’t like and start going after the markets for those goods and services. Only then will we see change.

    1. -I’m going to question a lot of this.

      ” First, complaining to the company that produces goods or services you dislike never does any good”

      Focus on the Family’s own media branch is one example of this being wrong. After its ‘Turning Red’ review originally categorized menstruation as ‘sexual content’ and got a huge outcry, that review eventually got at least partially amended.

      “Or if you don’t care about the rest of the world but you do care about your kids” I’d like to know what this meant, because the Bible and the Great Commission don’t tell us that we “don’t care about the rest of the world.”

      You’re making general statements about public schools, and using that as an excuse to get rid of all tax-supported schools in exchange for tuition schools and homeschooling programs (are those even accredited?) while using a tiny number of anecdotal examples to make your point. Converting to homeschooling wouldn’t have prevented horrors like the abuses that families like the Duggars either sanctioned or abetted, but I’m not going to use those examples to say, “If we got rid of all churches and all religious programs and replaced them with a mixture of evidence-based education and/or scientific study, the market for adult therapy would disappear.” You’re concerned about the market for a television show? When too many people are attempting suicide after being abused? Or about the market for video games? When U.S. foreign and domestic policy has far more innocent real-life victims than all of the video games and shows and movies could ever claim?

      “If our communities were safer and people knew their neighbors better, there would be a less of a market for Facebook and other social networking sites.” What happens the next time we have another pandemic similar to the one we’re still in, though, and it once again becomes unsafe (well, more unsafe, we’re still not out of the woods yet) to interact face to face?

      I didn’t like Dead Space 2’s marketing or find it appropriate back when it was new, but I’m not going to unilaterally blame children or even inappropriate marketing schemes for that when too many people are trying to argue in favor of normalizing school-sanctioned physical assault against students in the name of discipline.

      Adam: Thanks for the article. I don’t like Smith’s behavior, but as the comments on Plugged In’s “Lightyear” article reminded me, I’m far concerned about too many Christians being upset over gays existing or doing gay things, instead of being upset over gays facing violence and being murdered. The world is watching the church’s priorities when some of us complain about television shows or pretentious dance routines instead of taking a stand against much more significant problems such as abuses in the church.

      1. -Exceot that is not the point of this article- the point is what God intended for good ie the beautifulness of marraige and sex is being turned into an anything goes with no thought thought to the disatrasous consequences of behavior. Although I don’t at all agree with lgb sick agenda i definitely agree with author that Sam has some obvious deep seated issues that don’t just have to do with his homosexuality. I think the bigger picture is like said is the world has become twisted and lost and if we just focus on the outside surfaces we wont be able to truly enjoy how were intended to enjoy it or reach those who are so clearly lost and searching in a twisted and sadly lost world.

  2. -I’m not surprised that degenerates are acting degenerate. The Bible said they would. The world can’t understand the way God operates, and we shouldn’t expect them to.

    I’m more upset at the so-called “Christian” artists who sat in the audience the entire performance and had nothing to say about it afterward. Be aware of blindly accepting an artist just because they call themselves “Christian”. Just cuz they mention God in their songs a few times doesn’t mean anything.

    Then again, I don’t really care about the awards shows one way or another. Buncha rich and famous people patting themselves on the back for being rich and famous. Meh. I haven’t actually heard any good “new” music in years.

    1. -I do wonder if some Christian music artists are truly Christians because of the lack of theological depth in a number of songs, however it is hard to judge this because music is an emotional medium.
      I did not watch the Grammys and have not seen the music video. Some Christian singers may be unskilled at debating and were reluctant to criticize an event they had been invited to because you don’t criticize your host or employer. If the performance celebrates evil the way it seems from the news articles, and I were a Christian singer, I think I would turn down any future invitations to the Grammys.

    2. -This is exactly what I was going to mention! I would’ve walked out and if I had already received my Grammy for the night I would’ve thrown it away. It would constantly be both an open door to the enemy by acknowledging the satanic ritualesque performances as well as being a symbol saying I’m connected to these people.

  3. -Have to say definitely agree with especially the last part which is how the world so sadly now is taking a beautiful thing that God intended for good and making it a deviant, unholy, anything goes ill thought and disatrasous consequences behavior. Although I don’t at all agree with lgb sick agenda i definitely agree that Sam has some obvious deep seated issues that don’t just have to do with his homosexuality though that is definitely unbiblical and immoral demoralizing as well. I think the bigger picture is like said is the world has become twisted and lost and if we just focus on one thing we won’t be able to he’ll and reach those who are so clearly lost…

  4. – Agree with the articles’ author basically Smith is following a pattern to garner attention that will propel his already incredible voice and career to the next level. Recall Madonna. Blasphemy but we loved the visual nakedness as she bared all and allowed us to view after dark. Why get so cranked when a guy, or another version, pulls the same rabbit out of his little devil hat.
    I’m a Christian and a Gay man and every Sunday the televangelists, and I’m not just picking on them cause they’re far from being the only ones allowed to be broadcast into our living rooms, who spew out their version of ‘Christian’ often filled with hate speech aimed at segments of God’s creation. So beyond Sam and Kim’s song it’s the artistic expression and representation that wrinkled our skin. The imagery parodied the misguided masses fawning at the knees of the Evil ensnaring them to the hateful beliefs of that tv man of the gospel. Showing you just how unholy all of that show and manipulation is, need I mention the mansions and rolls royces that Jesus would have certainly approved of.
    Kim Petras in a cage….this represents what becomes of you when, at that ‘gospel devils’ beck and call, are chained to their minds’ lies. It’s meant to disturb and pointed directly at all the holier-than-thou amoung us. I believe the words are Love one Another, if you can’t or aren’t willing, then turn the channel.
    Simply my reading/opinion on what I observed at that performance. I enjoyed reading all of your comments.

    1. -I can’t see anywhere in the bible that allows someone to live as a homosexual and still be considered a follower. Saying you’re a gay Christian isn’t anywhere biblical.

  5. I found the whole thing more campy than shocking. It’s an artist’s job to question the status quo, push boundaries, and challenge traditional values. That’s nothing to panic about.

    Anyway, Christians should feel relieved that this was considered edgy enough to cause a little furor. That’s proof that, as much as Christians like to decry the evils of modern pop culture, traditional Christian morality is still our cultural default.

  6. -Our response is SUPPOSE to be that it’s unacceptable and we should call it out as such. You’re to judge this blatant type of blasphemy and not try to explain it away. You can absolutely see what his heart is, and Tim’s. Also, I’m not sure why your referring to Tim as Kim anyways as that God didn’t make him a woman, referring to him as that woman is agreeing with it.