WAP is a feminist battlecry

The argument

Proponents of the position that there is no problem with 'WAP' argue that the song functions as a feminist anthem — a rallying assertion of women's sexual autonomy and agency. At its heart, the argument runs, feminism is about women's freedom to define their own lives, including their own sexuality, on their own terms rather than according to standards set by men or by a society that has long sought to control and shame female desire. 'WAP', in which two women openly and confidently celebrate their own pleasure and set their own expectations of partners, is a vivid expression of exactly that freedom: women as the authors of their sexual narrative rather than its objects. The argument places the song within a tradition of reclaiming what has been used against women. Female sexuality has historically been policed, suppressed and treated as shameful, and women who express desire openly have been condemned in ways men never are. By refusing that shame and instead proclaiming their desire loudly and unapologetically, the artists turn a source of historic control into a statement of empowerment — a 'battlecry', as proponents put it, against the double standards that grant men sexual freedom while denying it to women. Its commercial triumph amplified that message to a global audience. From this standpoint, a song in which women assert ownership of their bodies and pleasure, defy the shaming of female sexuality, and claim the same freedoms long afforded to men is feminist in both content and effect. It advances women's autonomy by celebrating it openly and refusing to apologise for it. Because 'WAP' is a feminist anthem asserting women's sexual agency, this argument holds, there is no problem with it.

Premises

Counter-arguments

Critics — including some feminists — reply that equating explicit sexual display with liberation is contested. They argue the song can be read as reproducing a male-gaze, commodified template of female value rather than transcending it, and that an 'empowerment' framed entirely through sexual availability is a narrow version of feminism. On this view 'feminist' is exactly what is in dispute: sexual autonomy and market-packaged sexuality are not the same thing, so the song's boldness doesn't settle that it advances women's interests. Treating it as unambiguously feminist forecloses legitimate feminist critique of how female sexuality is produced and sold, so 'it is a feminist anthem, therefore no problem' assumes the very point at issue.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P1] Some feminists argue that framing empowerment entirely through explicit sexual display can reproduce a male-gaze, commodified template of female value rather than transcending it. [Rejecting P2] 'Feminist' is contested here: sexual autonomy and market-packaged sexuality are not the same, so the song's boldness doesn't settle that it advances women's interests. [Rejecting P3] Treating the song as unambiguously feminist forecloses legitimate feminist critique, so 'it is a feminist anthem, therefore no problem' assumes the very point in dispute.