Kathleen Hanna is relaxed about pop star feminism

When Taylor Swift, or similar, talks about feminism, it might not be your mother's feminism, or your elder sister's. But is that a problem?

Kathleen Hanna isn't sure that it is:

I remember back in the Nineties being like, “We’re being commodified,” so I understand people being like, “We don’t want feminism to become this fashion that has nothing behind it.” But I’m not really worried about that. When somebody that’s a huge megastar that has so many young fans, like Taylor Swift or Miley Cyrus or Beyoncé, comes out and says, “I’m a feminist,” I mean, that’s the sound of hundreds of thousands of girls typing the word into the Internet.

In other words: Taylor Swift Feminism is a gateway. And any entry point is to be welcomed.

Embed and breakfast man: Kate Nash

To offset the bad taste of Hollywood deciding to not let Dre beating a woman up spoil a good story, here's Kate Nash talking to Broadly:

Some men have short dicks. Get over it.

There's currently proposals in Finland to strengthen rape laws, which has upset men like this who feel that there's something ridiculous about the idea that simply not having consented to sex means you're being raped.

The blog is depressing, as are the comments beneath. But there is something extraordinary contained within. Suddenly, in between cock-wearers raging at how unfair the idea of asking the person you're fucking if it's okay, and suggesting that perhaps "violence" would somehow be the appropriate response, out of nowhere anonymous pipes up:

An example of the kind of idiocy we are surrounded with:

"This single, which involves a woman mocking the size of a man's penis, was also released in a toned down version replacing the word "dick" with "short" (the song was also released under the censored title "Short Short Man").[1] Co-writer Manfred Mohr told the Los Angeles Times that the point of the song was to attract attention. "We figured there were all these songs by men bashing women and treating women like sex objects. So we decided a song that turned the tables on men might attract some attention."[2] According to the vocalist Sandra Gillette, the point of the song is to "strike back at all the women-bashing songs in pop, especially in rap." [2]"

From subchapter "Content":

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short_Dick_Man

Yes, that's someone who not only is still angry about a song that came out twenty years ago, but also seems to have completely missed the point that it was designed to get the rise out of people like him. Even while posting a piece from Wikipedia that explains that that was the point.

Maybe, though, anonymous has a point. How can men thrive when, once every couple of decades, an attempt is made to reflect back the inherent sexism of a large part of Western culture? That's just going to make those very, very tiny dinkies shrink ever further.



Won't someone think of the child-men?

Bookmarks: Shirley Manson

There's a great interview with Shirley Manson over at Drowned In Sound, where she wonders what happened to provocative women in music:

“It’s tough for anyone to be in the music industry, but I think what has happened in the last decade is that a lot of women have forgotten what a struggle it was for previous generations to even get a foot in the door in the music scene and so have forgotten how tenuous their holding is. As a result I haven’t seen much effort into trying to redefine the way women have historically been viewed as solely visual treats and playthings. Make no mistake, there is still an incredible struggle for women to be treated as equal around the world and in the music industry. I’ve always felt a responsibility to conduct myself a certain way. Before I broke into the music scene there weren’t that many empowered women getting played on the radio. There are still very few women who have managed to navigate a career of any length or are considered of any worth and that bothers me.”

Sioux throws shoe

Siouxsie is unhappy with the way women are treated by what's left of the music industry:

Speaking at the launch of her live DVD, Finale, the iconic singer told 6 Music: "There are some strong female performers but the industry's pre-occupation with the packaging of how a woman looks has gone completely the other way, back to almost the 60s, early 70s.

"I like a bit of eye candy like anyone but to have it solely about the eye candy and have it fall into a category so rigidly as well is wrong."

Whenever they make a programme about Women In Rock, Sioux always pops up, shortly before Kate Bush and Annie Lennox; very few of the programmes bother to mention that despite all this trail-blazing decades ago, it's apparently still considered so unusual for a woman to be a (mainstream) rock star that it's considered worthy of a concept for a television or radio show.

But, hey, there's always Susan Boyle, right?

6Music also says this:

Siouxsie, who came to fame in 1976 in the infamous Sex Pistols interview with Bill Grundy before becoming a star with The Banshees, also criticised the way music is sold.

Did her appearance being leered over on Today really make her famous? I was too young and, besides, we got Southern not Thames, but I've always had the understanding that once TV companies felt bold enough to start running footage of the infamous appearance a few years after it happened, the idea that Siouxsie was in the background was considered noteworthy.

I'm Jewel, and Palin's like a glittery prize

Apparently falling for the line that women didn't like Palin because she wasn't feminist enough, Jewel has leaped to fellow Alaskan Sarah Palin's defence:

"Alaskan women are very can-do women. We're the pioneer state! The women who settled (in) Alaska had a large role in shaping it. The way I was raised, I never thought I was any different than boys. You can really see that in Sarah Palin."

Fair enough - although Sarah Palin's background is beauty shows and sports reporting, which is hardly the sort of stuff that shaped the pioneer state. (Actually, isn't Ohio and not Alaska the Pioneer State anyway?)

The trouble is, of course, shooting a few moose doesn't make a feminist. Certainly not if you do it in your time off from, say, happily allowing rape victims to be charged for the kits to collect evidence, or leading attacks on reproductive rights.