Pull Up the People

Idly watching TV last night, I was shocked to hear M.I.A.'s "Galang" blasting from my speakers. No, I wasn't watching New York Noise [sic] but rather tuned to a Honda Civic commercial on CBS. A really fucking lame Honda Civic commercial at that, filled with bad animation, explosions, and cars swooping through the air like superheroes. The ad even used "Galang"'s rebel yell/take it to the streets coda, just to complete the utter debasement of the song.

Yeah, I know we live in an all-consuming corporate culture and have managed to get over such dissonant oddities as The Stooges "1969" used to advertise deals on long distance. But what does it mean for a self-proclaimed revolutionary who raps about overthrowing the system and compares herself to Public Enemy in interviews to sell her song for a car commercial six months after releasing it? You may ask, would "Fight the Power" be any less potent if it was used to shill for Friskies a year after its release? Yes, yes it would.