Under My Thumb: Coercive Control and the Sensitive Victim

(Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay)

The Rolling Stone’s song “Under my Thumb” is supposedly about a victimized man who was pushed around by his woman. Finally he decided he’d had enough of her controlling ways, so he decided to push back — by abusing her.
Of course, Mick Jagger doesn’t admit to the abusive aspect of his lyrics. In an interview from 1984 he stated: “The whole idea was that I was under her thumb, she was kicking me around. All I did was turn the tables around. So women took that to be against femininity where in reality it was trying to ‘get back’ against being a repressed male.”

Spoken like a true abuser.

The lyrics to this song clearly display misogynistic attitudes and applaud abusive behaviours — and it remains one of the Rolling Stones most popular tunes.

“Under my thumb … It’s down to me.
The difference in the clothes she wears, down to me.
The change has come. She’s under my thumb.
And ain’t it the truth babe?”

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