“Both Ways,” a song on Liam Payne’s new album, is being interpreted in two very different ways.
The LP1 track is about a woman inviting the singer to have a threesome with another woman.
"My girl, she like it both ways / She like the way it all taste / Couple more, we'll call it foreplay / No, no, I don't discriminate,” he sings.
“Nothing but luck that she got me involved, yeah / Flipping that body, go head, I go tails / Sharing that body like it's our last meal / One and a two and a three, that's for real.”
But is it a celebration of open sexuality and a woman’s right to make choices about her own body or a misogynist fetishization of sexually fluid women?
It didn’t take long for the “cancel culture” crowd to get the hashtag “#liampayneisoverparty” trending.
“Bordering biphobic,” tweeted @BxllaScarlett, who accused Payne of “perpetuating the idea that bi women are only bi for men.”
@tooyoungsky fumed that “bi women aren’t just to have sex with you.”
And Twitter user @urielystyles called Payne’s lyrics “misogynistic and gross” because “he literally is talking about bi women like objects and saying he’s SHARING HIS GIRL AROUND.”
In fact, Payne sings “she got me involved” and “she said, ‘Come on, boy, let's do this’” as well as “She said, ‘Come on, watch me while we do this.’”
As of Saturday morning, Payne hadn’t publicly addressed the criticism.