Review: A Look Inside Kathleen Hanna's Feminist Punk Tell-All "Rebel Girl"
IN 1988 TIME MAGAZINE ASKED “IS FEMINISM DEAD?” — on its front cover, yet Kathleen Hanna was proof that it was alive and well. Bikini Kill and Le Tigre frontwoman published Rebel Girl, her feminist punk tell-all, which provides an intimate look into Hanna’s experiences as a woman in the indie music scene, which was riddled with sexual and emotional violence.
Hanna used a built-in computer app like TextEdit to craft the manuscript, where she wrote more than 600 pages that ultimately was cut by half–leaving us to wonder what stories weren’t printed, but the stories that were printed left a lasting impact that can resonate with any woman.
Hanna explains that her journey as a musician can’t be “untangled” from “male violence” and it goes as far back as her childhood.
Her first experience with music occurred when she enrolled in guitar lessons with a classmate. Hanna recalls the ridicule she and her friend endured during their “Twinkle, Twinkle” solos. The boys in the class laughed at them and made comments saying girls can’t play guitars, which ultimately led her to abandon guitar lessons. This initial story was tame compared to some of the others shared in this book, but the impact it left behind was substantial. It depicts that first time where a young girl learns that “girls aren’t meant to do ‘boy’s’ things.” But then as we grow older, as Hanna did, we’ll find the representation we were searching for that tells us “wait, girls can do whatever they want.” Hanna clarifies that when she saw the Go-Go’s play live at the Paramount Theatre in Portland, she wished she could say that she had a “feminist epiphany” — but she didn’t. It seemed like it was a normal thing for a girl to do.
Hanna’s experiences seemed to tell her another story. She recalls a time when Babes in Toyland was playing in Olympia, and everyone at the party had something negative to say about the all-girl band. Hanna considered their lyrics feminist poetry, but people decided that because the girls were pretty everything else they did was meaningless. People thought that Kat Bjelland “must suck” and that “people only cared about them because they were girls.” It’s as if these women were pariahs for something that should be normal. All they wanted to do was to make music and perform it, and yet they experienced pushback in the punk scene — a scene that is supposed to be an accepting place for misfits.
Hanna used Bikini Kill as an outlet to reject the patriarchy. She used songwriting as a tool to explore different parts of herself, such as the oppressed and oppressor dynamic. She used her lyrics to express a woman talking back to the male gaze in her own mind. It’s as if she took everything she was told and spit it back out at them, defying what was expected of a young girl. Sit pretty and keep your mouth shut was never something Hanna could abide by.
Bikini Kill wasn’t easily accepted. They were often called a novelty band by musicians they were performing with. Once they were opening for an AC/DC cover band that told them, “The only reason you got this show is because you’re girls.” They also received abysmal reviews in the press. Bikini Kill opened for Nirvana at the Paramount in Seattle and a reviewer at the Seattle Tribune wrote, “Opening act Bikini Kill… serves as a reminder that not all Seattle rock bands are ready for the big-time. The band were musically unremarkable, but showed an enthusiasm that helped forgive what they lacked in talent.”
These experiences seemed to embolden Hanna. She wanted to carve out a space for girls in the music scene, and this began with Hanna shouting into the mic “Girls to the front” at their shows. This resulted in backlash in the Olympia scene. They were often called “man haters” and “reverse sexists” for this act. Hanna wanted to engage with the girls that came to see her shows by handing out lyric sheets and creating room for them in the crowd. This was more important to her than any words someone could call her.
Beyond this Hanna wanted nationwide Riot Grrrl chapters, and began this journey in Washington D.C. at Positive Force, a local punk collective. This space allowed girls to talk about their trauma. It ranged from having their music taste questioned to stories about rape. This place was important, and more of these chapters were necessary for girls to feel less alone in a patriarchal world.
Hanna notes that even though Riot Grrrl was cathartic and needed for these young women, it also had several issues. She states that the meetings predominantly consisted of white girls, and she attempted to change this by frequenting Black neighborhoods. Hanna admits initially this was a tokenistic gesture, since she should’ve invited more women of color to their very first meeting. Hanna set up a workshop called Unlearning Racism at the Riot Grrrl Convention, but this ended up backfiring as Hanna says the “workshop was morphing into a white supremacist bitch fest.”
Thirty years later, there's a resurgence of feminist punk music in the underground scene, and it's significant to observe that many of these issues are slowly improving, but Hanna leaves us with some food for thought.
“Take the good stuff into the future and leave the lack of intersectionality behind. But don’t call it Riot Grrrl, because it has bad connotations for a lot of people. You all can think of a better name!”
Rebel Girl is a raw and compelling story for women musicians. The stories written by Hanna allow us to feel vindicated, and that our experiences of violence and sexism aren’t singular. Other women have had these experiences and regardless of the adversity, they are still able to continue creating. Rebel Girl reminds us that our art is important and needs to be made, especially during a time when women’s rights are on the chopping block.
