B$#@& You Wasn't With Me Shootin' in the Gym!

"Kobe my n&*$@ I hate it had to be him/B$#&% you wasn't with me shootin' in the gym!/(Huh! B&^#$ YOU WASN'T WITH ME SHOOTIN' IN THE GYM!)" -Drake and Rick Ross "Stay Schemin'"

I take severe issue with a lot of this song, but a special part of me dies every time I hear this line rapped by Drake and then co-signed with extreme emphasis by Rick Ross. I could dissect Drake's entire verse until the world is dying of laughter, but I'm sure some more famous blogger already has. Instead I want to focus on this particular part of the song. Stay Schemin' talks about how people are always plotting on their material possessions and sometimes their lives. Therefore, they feel the need to stick to and stick to their male friends like glue. In theory that's fine, but then Drake of all people starts his verse, and their case crumbles.

For those who haven't heard the song, he's talking about the Kobe and Vanessa Bryant divorce. At the time of Drake writing this verse, Vanessa Bryant was scheduled to receive $150 million dollars in their divorce settlement. Would you like to know why? Because Kobe Bryant cheated on her!!!! For some reason men become outraged when a husband is ordered to pay his wife money after they part ways. I don't get it. He was out there doing God knows what with The Lord only knows who. Not only did he violate his vows; he put his wife's life in danger. HIV, AIDS, Hepatitis C, and a myriad of other diseases easily could seal her fate when he gets done with his extramarital rendezvous. Does that matter? No. He's just that selfish. Yeah, yeah, yeah, he might have used condoms. Those aren't 100% effective. What about the emotional turmoil she suffers as a result? Her feelings don't matter because she got to live a life of luxury, and she had a man, right? People who think this way really need to get their lives together.

Nevertheless, the line is hilarious to me. Drake and Rick Ross need to cut it out, acting like some reverend/deacon tag team who preached some marvelous sermon with this one line. For Rick Ross, it's simple: Of course she wasn't with him shooting in the gym. He wasn't with him shooting in the gym. Nothing about Rick Ross says he's been to the gym this century. In fact, it sounds like he lost his breath co-signing that single line. Did he pass out after yelling it? I wanted to pass him my Albuterrol after hearing him say it the first time. In the infamous words of Jay-Z, "We don't believe you! You need more people!"

And then there's Drake. I'm no fan of his. In fact, after he remade Back That Thang Up I was done with his existence. His last album set masculinity back about forty thousand years. Just about every song was about rescuing strippers from their degrading lives of nudity and lap dances. Then there was Marvin's Room, the king of all haters' songs. He's supposed to be the savior of womankind, yet he comes with this foolishness. So it's okay to save strippers, but husbands shouldn't have to take care of their wives? What am I missing here? No, she wasn't with you "shootin' in the gym," but she was taking care of your kids, sitting at home alone while you were on the road acting like you were God's gift to the world, keeping your vows fresh while you defiled your marriage. No, she wasn't with you in the gym, but she was sitting at home being ridiculed by your sex scandals. No, she wasn't with you shooting in the gym, but she did make the sacrifice of having a husband who was there year-round for a husband who was on the road most of the time. No, she wasn't with you shooting in the gym, but she did give up a life of privacy to be followed around by paparazzi.

It kills me that there are men out there who think that once they get caught messing up that the wife is supposed to either grin and bear it or kick rocks with flip flops and no socks but be mute about the pain. Somehow if the tables were turned, Vanessa Bryant would be labelled an ungrateful heaux with no morals. But because Kobe Bryant is a man with a penis who can shoot a ball into a hole, she should shut up and enjoy the diamonds on her finger. Listen. No diamond in the world can heal the wounds that being cheated on causes. The shine may make you turn a blind eye to it, but I guarantee it can't make you forget it. When a man betrays his marriage it causes the woman to pick herself apart, wondering what she did wrong. Why wasn't she good enough? What did the other woman (women) do so well that she didn't? If she twerked her booty just a little bit more would he have remained faithful? Was she the wrong skin tone? Did she not fry the chicken right? (Well, Vanessa probably didn't have that last thought running through her mind, but you get my point). Then she has to decide whether or not she's willing to forgive him. Forgiveness is a stressful process to endure. It doesn't make it any easier if the only part he's sorry about is getting caught. It makes it even more difficult when there are escape clauses like, "A man's gonna do what a man's gonna do." Then she has to refrain from retaliating in any way that will send her to jail. It's a difficult thing to deal with.

So then she decides to leave. She and her children were accustomed to a certain way of living prior to his infidelity. I for one would never rely solely on my spouse for income. Life is too unpredictable for that. However, I've never been married to a millionaire. I can't judge others for what they decide to do. All I can say is that a lot of athletes' wives don't work. Instead they raise the kids and make the family look good. Some of them use their husbands' names to become entrepreneurs. Some don't, and that's fine too. According to Drake and Rick Ross, because a wife decides to walk away before she gets burned to the point of no return (you can take that both literally and figuratively), she deserves nothing. She wasn't an LA Laker, so she should get nothing. Yet it's okay to take Peanut and Smash and them - your "niggaz" - to the bar and treat them to bottles like they're girls, buy them cars like they're girls, look out for them like they're girls. Your woman is the giver of life, the carrier of your legacy. Why is your honesty and loyalty tied to people who share your gender and can do nothing for you but suck up your fame and fortune?

I get a real hearty laugh when Drake says, "Kobe my n^&&@, I hate it had to be him..." This sounds to me like the fact that he has championship rings means he doesn't have to remain loyal to his wedding ring. Kobe didn't seem to hate when it was him stepping outside of his marriage. How did Kobe Bryant become the victim here all of a sudden? So he loses money, so what? The snatch must have been worth it for him to risk destroying his family. So wearing gold and purple means he doesn't have to be held accountable for his actions? Isn't that as bad as saying, "I sure hate Keke Wyatt had to go to jail for shooting her husband. She has such a lovely voice"? What does one have to do with the other? Like DMX said, "You do dirt, you get dirt." That's the bottom line.

I could go on and on about how hilarious this part of the song is to me. I'm not talking sarcastic hilarious either. If this song comes on in the car when I'm pulling up to my house, I make it a point to sit there and listen to it until that part comes on. Then I laugh so hard you would think Def Comedy Jam came back. I guess Drake got tired of whining about all of his girly problems, so he decided to complain about someone else's. The sad part is that we spend so much of a girl's childhood telling her how much a man is supposed to love her. She grows up to find out that men are only loyal to each other. They're so worried about what other people are trying to do to them and take from them, yet they tend to sweep under the rug what they do to hurt others. It's called accountability. It goes hand and hand with responsibility. Men will never know that, though, as long as they have other men (or Drake) sticking up for them, telling them that their status in life nullifies their obligations to the women who they love. Well, keep being more concerned with those dudes who ride for you. After you're done burning out the women who stand by your side, those dudes and their stupid song lyrics will be all you have.