Not so fine!

A still from Guru Randhawa’s music video. Critics have slammed it for being a sticky, looping earworm

The late '90s and early 2000s saw many music videos with women at the centre. They were dressed skimpily and gyrating all over our screens. Fast forward to 2026, and mainstream pop music is simply recycling.

Guru Randhawa's latest track Fine Shyt is, simply put, brainrot. It's frankly quite "shyt"; a sticky, looping earworm featuring lyrics comparing a woman's waist to an Audi steering wheel and her walk to a G-Wagon. But the real talking point isn't just the lazy songwriting; it's the visual treatment.

Set in a corporate office, the video features Randhawa as a senior professional, trying to look intensely busy at his desk, while a bevy of female colleagues and Internet creators - including Ruhee Dosani, Divinity Bisht, Arshia Sinha, Raema Grover, Darlene Laura, and Mehar Kaur - interact with the space.

Vishwesh Krishnamoorthy and Utkarsha Kotian

It opens with a cheeky disclaimer: "(Sic) Highly advise you don't try this at your actual 9-to-5 unless you want to be permanently banned from the office by HR. No corporate policies were harmed." But this is exactly what's worrying about the song.

Fine Shyt has triggered a massive wave of cringe-fests, memes, and hard questions about why women in a workplace are performing entirely for the male gaze. Previously, Randhawa's song Azul faced backlash for sexualising school girls in the video.

Randhawa, though, has remained entirely unfazed. Taking to Instagram, he brushed off the criticism with a caption: "Guilty as charged of making songs that repeat in your head forever… (sic)It's just a silly little slang… calm down, calm down, calm down, fam." It's a textbook deflection we have heard a thousand times before.

Another still from Guru Randhawa's music video which got flak for sexualising women in the workplace

Behind the scenes, the mechanics of these videos are driven by pure commercial calculus. Filmmaker Vishwesh Krishnamoorthy, also a member of the metal band Scribe, points out that creators in the business aren't losing sleep over social responsibility or artistic ethics.

"Nobody in there is thinking that. It's like asking people who sell processed sugar to be mindful of diabetics," Krishnamoorthy explains. "Things that involve women presented with some kind of covert or overt vulgarity are often re-watched in private by men. And that, simply from an application point of view, is just more views."

Krishnamoorthy adds that this regression runs deep into societal conditioning. "I can't believe the second most populated country in the world continues to get titillated by cleavage," he says.

What makes Fine Shyt particularly jarring isn't just the objectification; it's the music video's setting. As Utkarsha Kotian, senior faculty at Whistling Woods International, points out, the real discomfort comes from placing it squarely in a workplace. "If it were any other space - a basketball court or a garden - it would still be problematic but not as much out of place. The fact that it's a workplace, I think that has catapulted it... That was the one thing that made me the most uncomfortable."

A fascinating paradox within the video's casting is the inclusion of prominent digital creators and Internet personalities like Ruhee Dosani alongside other performers. Yet, unlike background dancers bound to traditional item-number styling, Dosani is dressed in her signature casual streetwear rather than leaning into standard titillation.

This is, of course, a calculated strategy by production houses. By bringing in recognisable, beloved internet influencers, music videos attempt to borrow a veneer of progressive credibility and relatability. It acts as a shield, masking the underlying regressive gaze with familiar, Internet-friendly faces.

It proves that while the packaging has adapted to the creator economy - by swapping traditional background dancers for Instagram-famous faces - the core framework remains entirely unchanged.

Some dancers have stepped forward to defend the concept, stating they simply enjoyed the dancing. Others argue that the choreography was just fun and that viewers are reading too much into a simple club track.

But it only further highlights how deeply conditioned the medium has become.

Kotian says, "There is an internalised misogyny in a lot of people where you see yourself represented in a certain way, and you say, ‘Okay, this kind of representation is fine.' And I'm not saying that it's not okay for you to make those decisions for yourself either. But it's murky territory to think that a woman will come in and that representation is always going to be better or more authentic."

At the same time, as Kotian highlights, putting the blame entirely on the dancers ignores the systemic problem: "It also takes away any responsibility from male producers or male creators."