The story behind Slick Rick’s ‘Treat Her Like a Prostitute’
Slick Rick is a hugely influential rapper, whose vivid storytelling and sense of humour made him a hip-hop legend. But there are unsavoury elements to his character and music, and that is exemplified by a song like ‘Treat Her Like A Prostitute.’
The track opened his debut album The Great Adventures of Slick Rick, released in 1988, so it was quite the statement of intent. The song is essentially a call to all men to treat their female love interests in a transactional way, “’cause all they do is they hurt and trample.” It comes across, to put it mildly, as a deeply misogynistic song.
But Rick stood by the track, even 20 years after its release. Speaking to Submerge about it in 2008, he insisted that the song was intended as a joke. It reflected his youthful exuberance at the time he wrote it.
“Well at that age, you’re not trying to ruffle any feathers, you’re just trying to have fun,” he said. “It’s the adults that come in and try to play the role. As a child you’re just writing raps to entertain your age group and your audience.”
He argued that ‘Treat Her Like a Prostitute’ was “really just a goof on relationships. You know coming in and finding the mailman’s pants—that stuff is humorous; it’s not for critics to come in and dissect and all this other junk. Regardless, at that time, that’s how a younger adolescent was looking at life.”
Rick was insistent that the song reflected young men’s attitudes at the time, which, to be fair, could well be the case. But it doesn’t necessarily follow that it is okay to give voice to those views in a song, but that’s what he did.
“I wasn’t saying treat women like a prostitute in the harsh sense of the word,” he claimed. “It was really to say when you’re with your chick make sure you’re sexually satisfied before you’re spoiling her because… I don’t know how to break it down, but that’s what I was thinking.”
He did concede that, as he grew up, he realised that “those words were kind of harsh.” But even so, he felt there was enough in the song to imply that his intentions weren’t all that bad. He pointed towards the second line, “Don’t treat no girl well until you’re sure of the scoop,” as evidence of this.
“Scoop means information right?” he said. “What’s this information on this girl you’re with? Is she out to use you? Is she genuine? What’s the record? Is she just after your dough, or is she going to talk to your friends later? Those were just cute stories to prove my point.”
If nothing else, this takes a very paranoid view of women and their intentions for getting into sexual relationships with men. It generalises and it immediately assumes the worst. As with so much hip-hop, it doesn’t hold up under any real scrutiny. That doesn’t necessarily affect Rick’s status within the culture, but it is a reminder that there are elements of hip-hop that always need to be pushed back against.