loosie: words: Loosie's Man of the Year

Loosie's Man of the Year

R. Kelly is the proud recipient of this year's award. .

by Douglas Passion | 2003.12.31

While admittedly not as laurel-laden as The Gowanus Al Qaeda Frogman 10,000 Meter Breaststroke Jumpoff, there are few honors more coveted than the Loosie Person of the Year Award. The lack of monetary rewards and television specials connected to our annual coronation has not deterred publishing industry insiders from speculating wildly about the identity of this year's recipient and sloshing our inboxes with a deluge of bitchy and desperate emails beseeching us for hints, clues and word searches. Why all the attention? It's a little trait called "Loosie Integrity"; quite simply, we can't be bought. Honest Injun, whoever is bestowed with the Loosie Person of the Year award did not pay us via back channel negotiations for the tribute.

2003 was an eventful year, flush with worthy candidates. Last year's winner, Karl Rove, arguably improved upon his brilliant 2002 performance by plotting secret presidential mock crotch plastic turkey runs to Iraq. We had all but pinned the badge to Private Jessica Lynchís firm bosom -- that is, until Hustler publisher Larry Flynt declined to print pre-surgical pics of her exposed mammaries. Iranian human rights activist Shirin Ebadiís interpretation of Islam offered more civil freedoms and 100% less stonings, but those fuckers at Nobel stole our thunder. Even the once elusive Saddam Hussein made a late run with his charismatic reemergence as a defiant hippie.

After careful consideration of our finalistsí qualifications and their comparative contributions to society, Loosie is proud to name R. Kelly the winner of our Person of the Year Award. More than anyone else on the planet, "The Lesbian R&B Thug" displayed the characteristics we treasure most -- resilience, creativity, bravado and cultural insensitivity.

Kells' odyssey began amongst the soft breezes of early June, 2002, a season when the love between a middle-aged man and a pre-teen woman blossoms. A comparison to the voyage of Jason's Argonaut is more appropriate, and we'll substitute Golden Showers for the Golden Fleece. A bushy-haired, wide-eyed and unshaven Kelly was arrested on 21 counts of child pornography for videotaping urine-drenched sexual encounters with underage girls. The shitstorm of protests, record smashings and Wendy Williams saline tears truly blew out the back of the tank when the tape's footage popped up on both the Internet and street corner bootlegs. Kelly's name quickly became a groan-inducing punchline for any joke that involved underage girls and/or urination. Cam'ron threatened to "R. Kelly" Nas's daughter on a dis song. The Best of Both Worlds, a collaborative album between Kelly and Jay-Z, went from a surefire multi-platinum success to Talib Kweli numbers before the piss had even dried on the toddler girl's chest. R. Kelly's career appeared over.

What a difference a year, 4 Billboard Awards and 2 Grammy nominations makes. For those itching to see Kells tarred, feathered and run out of Chi-Town on a rail, his contrition seemed to last the duration of one song, "Heaven I Need a Hug". Then the muscular arms of the Lord reached down and embraced the Pied Piper. With God's lightning bolts and Norse hammers striking down all haters, Kelly used the remix to "Ignition", which included the chorus "it's the remix to 'Ignition'", to re-ignite his popularity. A parade of hits soon followed and Chocolate Factory became hugely successful.

But Loosie does not give out the illustrious Person of the Year Award based only on a resurgent musical livelihood and an unholy alliance with the man upstairs. No, it is Kelly's complete and utter shamelessness that won our hearts. If a team of special shame-finding investigators with shame detectors and dogs trained to sniff out shame encountered Kelly, their instruments and shamedogs would remain as silent as the families of the girls Kelly abused. Let's follow the logic: if you were accused of having a predatory predilection for underage females, wouldn't avoiding overt association with groups whose entire fan base consists of underage females seem reasonable? Not to the man who escapes shamedogs with the greatest of ease. In maneuvers of Sir Francis Drake bravery, Kelly crooned on songs and pranced around in videos with both kiddie act B2K and kiddie rapper Nick Cannon.

Kelly's achievements in 2004 include even more than career resurrection and courage in the face of ignominy. His willingness to make beautiful music untethered by the shackles of freedom-stifling political correctness is a gift from Kells to the United States and the rest of the world. While our First Amendment rights were being assailed by both Ashcroft's sneaking and peaking henchmen and whiny semantics-bandits, Kelly was mimicking Asians in the "Thoia Thoing" hook and making videos with sand dunes, belly dancers, American flags and Indian music. Can I get a toot toot, can I get a beep beep?

Loosie Magazine will be celebrating R. Kelly's reception of the Person of the Year Award on Friday, January 16th at Bar Below, located on Smith Street in Brooklyn, New York. No, seriously.