Over at her new joint, Alyssa Rosenberg has some thoughts on Jay-Z/Solange I: The Tiff in the Lift:
So what do we think we will get out of pressing play?
Is it the nasty pleasure of seeing what we previously only speculated about: that the marriage the Knowles-Carters present to the outside world is subject to damage and indignity, just like any other? Do we want to see the spectacle of a woman whose career has followed a more idiosyncratic route and whose family life is less praised than those of her older sister acting out as that sister stands by placidly? Are Knowles-Carter’s biggest fans hoping for further proof of her perfection, her refusal to turn into either a harpy along with her sister or a woman who defends her man against her blood?
Perhaps. More likely, I think, is modernity's love of scandal, a sickly sweet snack we consume with the speed and ease of a Coke Classic. This is, of course, not a new observation; here's Daniel Bell in The Cultural Contradictions of Capitalism:
In modern culture, scandal is eagerly pursued only as yet another sensation. Modernity castrates the avant-garde by quickly accepting it, just as it accepts, with equal equanimity, elements from the Western past, the Byzantine past, the Oriental past (and present) in its omnium-gatherum of cultures.
And, indeed, the Jay-Z/Solange fight was notable for how un-extraordinary it really was. Rosenberg drew a parallel to Donald Sterling (more on that in a moment), but I think a better comparison is to the fight videos that have turned WorldStarHipHop into an Internet powerhouse. Street violence—the random assault of individuals by common criminals—was once something to be denounced. At the very least, it was ignored, treated as an embarrassment. Now it's big business: If you happen upon a brawl, best pull out your iPhone, start shooting video, and start shouting "World Star! World Star!" in the hopes that the images you capture can provide popcorn for the masses. Gone is the impulse to step in and stop a beatdown. Gone is the desire to call for help or grab the authorities. The appetite for scandal must be fed, and everyone with a smartphone is a would-be chef.
The aesthetics of the Jay-Z/Solange fight are even similar to those you'd see on WorldStarHipHop, in a weird way. True, the video is eerily silent; you don't have the chattering masses whoopin' it up and shouting "DAYUM" as Solange wildly kicks out. But look closely at the visuals: You'll note that TMZ doesn't have the actual video from the surveillance camera. Rather, they have video of a screen playing the footage shot by someone on their cell phone, a shakily held document of a private moment chortled at by tens of millions of people that would otherwise have been lost, like so many tears in rain.
And here is where I'll circle back to Sterling. Frankly, Jay-Z and Solange and Beyonce have less of an expectation to privacy in a public elevator than Donald Sterling had when he was discussing his feelings with his kinda-sorta-maybe mistress. An elevator is, after all, a public place. But the violation of their privacy likely stings no less, even if the consequences will be far more minuscule. When everything becomes fair game—when every comment, look, action becomes open for viewing and examination by the masses—we have lost something very precious. The urge to broadcast the scandalous behavior of figures major and minor is, perhaps, not new. But we have entered an era in which it can be done with a speed and ease never before seen and little consideration for the rights and privileges of those around us is given. And that's not really something to celebrate.