Perhaps it is best to just be a half-assed feminist than any other kind of feminist. To dip in and out as and when. Sometimes it's a light-hearted piss take, on occasion a sincere feminist call to arms. Get it wrong? Oh well what do you expect, I never said I was anything more than a half-assed feminist. Beyonce has made the mistake of saying she was a feminist, not a half-assed feminist. Bringing up that question we've been asking for years, can you be a feminist and married to Jay Z?
It is difficult, being a self-confessed feminist in the public eye - half-assed or no. Because feminists often feel like they have to take what they can get celebrity or public figure-wise and therefore expect famous feminists to adhere to their own personal form of feminism.
It is difficult, being a self-confessed feminist in the public eye - half-assed or no. Because feminists often feel like they have to take what they can get celebrity or public figure-wise and therefore expect famous feminists to adhere to their own personal form of feminism.
Beyonce has, no doubt deliberately, repeatedly now disappointed her fellow feminists. Either she is showing us her pants which irks the feminists who believe there is only one way to display the female body. Or she is telling Vogue that feminist can be a strong word: "That word [feminist] can be very extreme. I guess I am a modern-day feminist. I do believe in equality. Why do you have to choose what type of woman you are? Why do you have to label yourself anything? I'm just a woman and I love being a woman... I do believe in equality and that we have a way to go and it's something that's pushed aside and something that we have been conditioned to accept." Or she is wearing hair extensions having cut all her hair off - freeing herself from the patriarchal mantle only to sew it back on.
| Usually I kind of roll my eyes at the reaction to Beyonce's 'feminist fails.' I for one would want Beyonce on my team, but it is a habit of feminism to say who can and who can't be feminist. However I noticed in my e-mail inbox today that my Google Alert for 'feminism' that there were two contrasting articles on Beyonce and her surprise album. | Is this amount of scrutiny helpful? You know what? Yes. |
One article posted in Time Ideas was entitled Flawless: 5 Lessons in Modern Feminism from Beyonce. The writer, Eliana Dockterman, dissects Beyonce's lyrics and praises her themes of cunnilingus, being a wife and mother and physical insecurity. Dockterman also addresses the issue of Beyonce's videos: "Are we supposed to have a problem with the fact that Beyonce is advocating that our society stop thinking of women as wives and sex objects as she grinds up on her husband in a leotard? I think we are. I think she wants us to think about how much of what she does is empowerment and how much is driven by the norms of popular culture." Dockterman is able to make peace with Beyonce's pop content and feminism.
The Huffington Post article by the Real Colored Girls is more critical. Bringing up how Jay Z's appearance on a Beyonce track rapping about how he's like Ike Turner is problematic at best. "we're concerned that the capitalist ethics of mainstream hip hop has seduced feminist allies into flirting with bottom bitch feminism in their silencing of those who would critique Bey and the systemic violence she represents."
Rather than concern themselves with Beyonce's wardrobe the writers examine her husband's contribution to her work and why they are troubled by Beyonce's place as a role model for black feminists: "As womanists and black feminists, we have a responsibility to bring it with our cultural work which we will infuse, at all times, with an ethic of care and responsibility."
Is this amount of scrutiny helpful? You know what? Yes. It's good to question everything. However Miley Cyrus, while receiving flack for saying she was one of the: "biggest feminists in the world" and Lily Allen do not seem to receive the same level of disappointed scrutiny. Question it.
Squeamish Kate
The Huffington Post article by the Real Colored Girls is more critical. Bringing up how Jay Z's appearance on a Beyonce track rapping about how he's like Ike Turner is problematic at best. "we're concerned that the capitalist ethics of mainstream hip hop has seduced feminist allies into flirting with bottom bitch feminism in their silencing of those who would critique Bey and the systemic violence she represents."
Rather than concern themselves with Beyonce's wardrobe the writers examine her husband's contribution to her work and why they are troubled by Beyonce's place as a role model for black feminists: "As womanists and black feminists, we have a responsibility to bring it with our cultural work which we will infuse, at all times, with an ethic of care and responsibility."
Is this amount of scrutiny helpful? You know what? Yes. It's good to question everything. However Miley Cyrus, while receiving flack for saying she was one of the: "biggest feminists in the world" and Lily Allen do not seem to receive the same level of disappointed scrutiny. Question it.
Squeamish Kate
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