Wrong Justin.

What I love most about Pandora is discovering new artists that never would have likely orbited my realm otherwise. But I also love discovering new-to-me songs by known artists. Like Justin Timberlake. (And yes, I do have Spotify. No, I don’t use it.)

One of my great joys in life is singing in the car. A few weeks ago I was driving along minding my own business. And this slow-tempo 90s-ish R&B-ish pop jam comes on that I’d never heard before or had somehow forgotten from high school. Then I thought, nice! JT has a new song out with a throwback vibe to it. I glanced at my phone to see what it was called.

Mother. Of. God.

Wrong. Justin.

Was I just feeling a Justin Bieber song?! Did anybody hear me??

There’s something unsettling that happens to your sense of self when an entrenched value or belief or stance is called into question. Or even proven false. It’s confusing. It’s like realizing you might actually be attracted to someone you thought you despised. And you find yourself spiraling around the question, What does this say about me?

With this curveball, I just started listening to the lyrics. And immediately got hit by a second curveball.

I just want you to know, that in spite of all the imperfections of who I am, I still wanna be your man.

Kiddo. You need to be a man to begin with before you can be *someone else’s* man.

While I doubt there was a surgeon faced with a difficult decision at his potentially hermaphroditic birth, I’m pretty sure he is, in fact, solely anatomically male. Polemic discussions about gender conformism and heteronormativity notwithstanding, kiddo “ain’t the most masculine fellow in the world”, as Eddie Murphy observed about Michael Jackson back in the day, “He sensitive.” But Michael Jackson was a world class entertainer and innovator. Justin Bieber was a millenial youtuber with mediocre talent and a blowdryer who skyrocketed to fame in the US.

As a side note, the hilarity and charm of the lesbianswholooklikejustinbieber Tumblr cannot be overstated. Especially since an awesome number of the pics are submitted by the young lesbians themselves. Who doesn’t love a good and autonomous self-aware sense of humor? The blogger recently said this too: “I just realized you’re all using me as a dating site…. welp.” So basically everybody wins. 

But I’m still struggling.

I still bee-lieeeeeeeve in love …

WELL!

What heroic conviction from a kid who’s still not old enough to rent a car. Which is not to say that teenagers and even children can’t get their hearts broken. But that is unfortunately by a parent or an adult who fails to care for them. Not by an equal with whom you’ve tried to build a life together. And it is not to say that millionaires need to rent cars. But an angsty 20-something just can’t invoke the same world-weary can’t-take-it-anymore hanging-on-by-a-thread anguish that say, Bonnie Raitt can in I Can’t Make You Love Me … or any blues song ever. I don’t care how much money he spent on his pretty little tough-guy tattoos. You know how many soccer moms have tattoos now? It’s not edgy anymore, little buddy. You’re not any harder than your fellow Canadian, Avril Lavigne. Who, incidentally, described herself when she first got big as “such a little hard-ass” when she was asked to reflect back on her career in Vanity Fair. Heavy eyeliner and leather wristlets don’t make you any more hard-ass than Chad Kroger. (I really do love Canadians in general. It’s just when their most wholesome popstars try to be edgy that my sanity starts to unravel.)

Perhaps my shame in really liking a Justin Bieber song only merits a tweet rather than an entire diatribe. Or perhaps he could just sing about bubble gum and baseball cards. Do they have baseball cards in Canada? Maybe he could sing more convincingly about Xboxes and snapchatting Selena Gomez.

My intent here is probably just an ageist attempt to put a fussy little zygote in his place, the believable parameters of which are far less reaching than his lyrics. But the real shame is not actually his music but the fact that I actually kind of like one of his songs.

I still believe in love too, kiddo. And I haven’t given your song the Thumbs Down yet.