Usher's latest single, "Lil' Freak," is an ode to arranging a ménage à trois. Helping to schedule the girl-on-boy-on-girl arrangement is hip-hop artist Nicki Minaj. In the song, Usher informs Minaj of a prerequisite to sleeping with him: "You go get some girls, bring them to me." She does.

This is not the first track to employ Minaj as threesome facilitator to the stars. In "Girls Kissing Girls," a track off Minaj's mixtape, Minaj aids Gucci Mane's request for participation in the song's titular activity. And in each song, Minaj readily indulges the man's sexual interest. From Minaj's contribution to "Lil' Freak":

Excuse me lil mama, but you could say I'm on duty
I'm lookin' for a cutie with a big old ghetto booty
I really like your kitty cat and if you let me touch her
I know you're not a bluffer, I'll take you to go see Usher

And from Minaj's verse in "Girls Kissing Girls":

Puh puh pop a beer, I'm a need some honey
Chew it like a gummy, stupid juicy oozy runny
Listen Gucci mane I got what u need
Keisha and Alisha and a million packs of weed
Girls everywhere Gucci go and get the camera
White girls too ohh Julie Annie Amber

There's reason to believe that Minaj is just as into this type of action as Gucci Mane and Usher are. Natalie Stein, writing for Bitch Magazine, notes that Minaj's music has consistently reinforced the popular assumption that Minaj is "a rumored lesbian (or bisexual, depending on who you ask)"—but that Minaj herself has stopped short of officially coming out of the closet. In the hip-hop world, Minaj's sexuality has been employed to fulfill the lesbian fantasies of heterosexual guys, but hip-hop hasn't yet give Minaj the space to truly own her identity.

[youtube:v=QhlSRMEvUkk]

As Nicki Escuerdo, who wrote on "Lil Freak" for feminist blog Heartless Doll, writes:

Who cares if the girl isn't into hooking up with other girls? If you want to hook up with Usher, he makes it clear that it's a requirement to bring another lady friend around. To prove not all women are opposed to Usher's message, the song features Young Money rapper Nicki Minaj, who conveniently happens to be bisexual (it's not a marketing ploy at all!) . . . Everybody should have the right to get their freak on and have threesomes if they want. But the way the Usher goes about getting two ladies in his bed, by using his celebrity to coerce girls to sleep with him, is sleazy.

But as Escuerdo goes on to note, the songs that situate Minaj's sexuality as a tool for heterosexual men also give Minaj some room to define herself. This is where things start to get interesting. In "Lil Freak," Minaj announces:

If i'm in yo city, I'm signin' them tig 'ol bitties
I'm plotting on how I can take Cassie away from Diddy
The girls want a Minaj yeah they wetter than the rain then
Usher buzz me in, everybody loves Raymond

I never thought I'd be commenting on the transgressive function of the phrase "tig 'ol bitties." Here, Minaj clues her listeners into the fact that her own sexual interests are hardly confined to pleasing Usher. In this verse, she's not looking to hook up with Cassie to help P. Diddy get off; she's looking to remove Diddy from the situation entirely. But after that little detour, Minaj brings the focus of her sexual interests back to Usher. At the moment the songs start to get gay, Minaj brings it back to a more acceptable sexual expression she converts her erotic energy to heterosexual fantasy.

"Girls Kissing Girls," interestingly, contains no such final caveat. Yes, the song gets its wide appeal by accessing the "Girls Gone Wild" version of faux-lesbianism, but it also refuses to end with heterosexual bliss. Though the beginning of the song has Gucci Man getting hot by observing Minaj's sexual relationships with women, in the end he loses the Minaj character to another girl: "Then I lost her number, never seen again / The best brain in the world, do her thing with a girl / But don't call her yo girl, or let her hang with yo girl."

In these songs, Minaj's interest in other women is quarantined to a specific context (the threesome) that allows men to retain control over Minaj's sexuality in public, even while Minaj winkingly suggests that these guys are hardly owning her in the bedroom. As Minaj gains more industry power as an independent artist, here's to hoping she'll be able to take lyrical control of her own sexuality—without the watchful eye of a big-named guy.

I spent part of Washington's snowed-in weekend sipping bourbon, building an igloo, and listening to one anonymous woman's horrific karaoke rendition of Deborah Cox's 1998 power ballad, "Nobody's Supposed to Be Here." At one break in the snow shelter action, a friend popped in a cassette tape containing the butchering of Cox's song, which he claims to have found laying on the ground at a Six Flags theme park.

Being unfamiliar with Cox's work, we hopped onto YouTube to listen to the original track, a resounding tribute to the man who made Deborah Cox love again. Beneath the video, a Cox fan had filed the following comment: "man she can sing so gud man i love her no homo she is now my idol like 4 real my gaol is too sing like her cuz she is truly amazing."

No homo? Seriously? I always thought the homophobic "no homo" declaration was a product of hip-hop's aggressive masculinity. Now, girls, too, are invoking "no homo" to clarify that they want to be able to belt maudlin R&B ballads about falling in love with men without being perceived as lesbians? What's going on here?

Earlier this year, Slate's Jonah Weiner argued that "no homo" represented a step forward for hip-hop, as it allowed male rappers to step outside the bounds of traditional masculinity and explore their feminine sides without being perceived as gay. "No homo" is blatant homophobia, Weiner argued, but at least it's blatant homophobia that allows rappers to kiss each other on the lips, take an interest in fashion, and engage in such homoerotic displays as "giddily dous[ing] each other" in champagne—as long as they're not actually gay.

But does "no homo" hold any similar gender-role liberation for women in hip-hop?

"No homo" hasn't caught on among lady MC's like it has with male rappers like Cam'ron, Lil' Wayne, and Kanye West. But back in 1995, Lil' Kim used the "no homo" tactic in order to spit some man-hating sentiments without being pigeonholed as a lesbian. In her verse on Junior M.A.F.I.A. track "Get Money," Kim announced, "I ain't gay, this ain't no lesbo flow."

"No lesbo" is clearly homophobic, but there's a hint of transgression here, as well. The anti-gay sentiment works to excuse the rest of Kim's verse, which directs a stream of hate at lying, cheating men. On the track, Kim ridicules men's penises, rejects men who want to play her "like a chicken," and insists that listeners "eat my pussy." It's a female version of Biggie's verse on the same track—a verbal take-down of lying, cheating "bitches." The only difference? There's no "no homo" caveat to Biggie's misogyny, because straight men are expected to hate women. Lil' Kim, on the other hand, must temper her misandry with a "no lesbo," as women who rail against male behavior are immediately assumed to be man-hating lesbians.

[youtube:v=FFC081OvKXM]

"No lesbo" helped Lil' Kim to speak out against men without being labeled a lesbian. It also allowed her to flaunt her sexuality in an aggressive, raunchy, self-serving way that had previously been reserved for male rappers. At one point in "Get Money," she flips the traditional sex script when she demands that her sex partner "get me open while Im cummin down your throat." But for the most part, female displays of sexuality in hip-hop are used exclusively to facilitate male pleasure and domination. That's another reason why "no lesbo" has failed to liberate women from traditional gender roles in the way "no homo" has for men—in male-dominated hip-hop, lesbianism is hot.

The sentiment that lesbians are sexual candy for straight men is coming from the same rappers who sprinkle "no homo" in their lyrics to avoid being labeled as gay themselves. On Kanye West's 2007 track "Stronger," he announced that he "would do anything for a blonde dyke." And in Lil' Wayne's Drake's recent contribution to "We Like Her," the "no homo"-loving rapper asked, "Are any of y'all into girls like I am, lesbi-honest?"

But as with the male homosocial displays made safe by the "no homo" disclaimer, lesbianism in hip-hop is only acceptable if it's not truly gay.

[youtube:v=Ts84yTlg0Ec]

Consider Gucci Mane's "Girls Kissing Girls," featuring rumored lesbian hip-hop artist Nicki Minaj. In the song, Gucci lays out some pornographic verses about girls doin' it before laying out his cautionary tale: Just don't hook up with real lesbians, or they'll steal your girlfriend: "Told her last time she can bring her other friend / Then I lost her number never seen again / The best brain in the world, do her thing with a girl / But don't call her yo girl, or let her hang with yo girl."

[youtube:v=3fBdgZUtpBg]

The sentiment that lesbianism is okay as long as it's a performance for men isn't confined to hip-hop, of course. Katy Perry's pop anthem "I Kissed a Girl" is the "no homo" anthem that never dared to say "no homo." The lyrics—"I kissed a girl and I liked it / Hope my boyfriend don't mind it"—reinforce the idea that girls should be free to kiss each other as long as they go home to their heterosexual relationships at the end of the day (and let their boyfriends watch).

"No homo" allows male hip-hop artists to explore their femininity. The new "no lesbo" sentiment, on the contrary, keeps women on an even shorter gender-role leash—they are allowed to explore their sexuality, as long as that sexuality is still controlled and consumed by men. Men are allowed to get manicures, wear purple fur coats, and geek out over fashion shows as long as they tack a "no homo" on their activities. Meanwhile, the "no lesbo" sentiment only helps women to continue to act sexy for men, not to claim their sexuality in the spirit of Lil' Kim. Despite the genre's fascination with token lesbianism, Bitch's Natalie Stein notes that mainstream hip-hop still discourages lesbian hip-hop artists from coming out.

"No homo" doesn't carry with it any more freedom for women to defy gender roles. Nevertheless, some female hip-hop fans are still eager to invoke "no homo" alongside their male counterparts. What else explains applying "no homo" to otherwise sexual-orientation-neutral activities, like being able to sing like Deborah Cox? On Urban Dictionary, "no lesbo" is defined as:

said after something potentially "lebian" has been said. Also used to state something does not have a lesbian connotation, even though it sounds that way

1.That's my bitch, no lesbo.
2.That ass is huge, no lesbo.

In most cases, "no homo" and "no lesbo" function not as a way to escape traditional gender norms, but as turns-of-phrase which help build community through conversation markers. Once boys are using "no homo," their female friends are going to want to use it, too—even if it doesn't make much sense, or help them to claim any transgressive power. When extended to women, "no homo" isn't what Jonah Weiner calls "progress"—it's just more casual homophobia coupled with some good, old-fashioned objectification of women.

Cataloguing the sexual euphemisms of rap music is one of my favorite pastimes. So when a commenter requested that I parse Gucci Mane's lyrics for hidden sexual undertones, I was happy to attempt to smoke out some hidden naughty bits in the rapper's contribution to Young Problemz' "Boi" (Mane weighs in at the 2:55 mark).

Perhaps I am off my game. Because  for the life of me, I can't make out any clear sexual imagery in Mane's lyrical feast of gyros, egg rolls, tacos, and sting rays:

Extra lamb like a gyro / Wrap 'em like a egg roll
Beat up out the taco / Feed 'em to the octos
Fully fully auto / Shawty bout that good plate
Fuck around next they be sleepin with a sting ray

While the taco reference inspires an obvious anatomical comparison, that octopus shit is beyond me. So I turned to CP''s resident art staff for help:

Arts editor Sarah Godfrey was similarly tripped up by the taco:

After listening a few times, I'm thinking Gucci has mixed his metaphors a bit here. Although the taco thing and the sleeping with a sting ray thing seem like sex euphemisms, I'm pretty sure the extra lamb thing is about money, and the wrap 'em like an egg roll and feed 'em to the octos lines are about hurting people. But maybe I just have a hard time understanding his country ass.

Arts editor Ted Scheinman suspects that "extra lamb" refers to the size of Mane's dick:

Line 1: possible Christ ref. Also, isn't this, like, the weirdest endowment boast ever? Shoulda made it a half-smoke!

Line 3: I prefer to read this line as "meat up out the taco." Slightly racier. Though, let's be frank, the mixed-food metaphors are starting to make me nauseous

Line 4: Do octopi go for ethnic food?

Line 7: OK, Mr. Mane has now officially jumped the shark into full-on erotic-aquatic imagery. Or I guess this is a threat, like sleeping with the fishes. Either way, Shawty better not fuck around.

Listings czar Mike Riggs thinks it's ALL about the taco. And don't call it a taco!

1.) Lamb meat is an imaginative substitute for "roast beef," which was likely the most popular slice-meat parallel to vagina pre-Gucci. It would be worldly, perhaps even sophisticated, if comparisons to deli stuffs weren't pejorative.

2.) I hate taco references, thanks to the scene in "Me, Myself, and Irene" in which Jim Carrey commandeers the PA at a grocery store to harangue a woman who's buying Vagisil for her "cheesy taco."

3.) Then again, the "good plate" sounds, well, good! Like it's all tasty down there! And let's face it, the vagina is a tasty place, so it might as well be a tasty plate.

4.) I don't know about that whole stingray/egg roll/octo thing, except that octopus reminds me of Octopussy, the female lead from the same-titled 1983 James Bond movie, starring seafood connoisseur Roger Moore.

In closing, rappers can and should do better by the vagina. It's what they seem to live for, and yet they talk about it in terms befitting a so-so food cart. Jesus.