"I got this Jesus tattoo on my wrist when I was 18, because I know that it's (religion) always going to be a part of me. When I'm playing, it's staring right back at me, saying, 'Remember where you came from." • Katy Perry
Remember where you came from, indeed.
So, I don't think it's a secret that I have a deeply growing contempt for Katy Perry.
But I found
a fellow Perry hater who loves to blog about it too!! Hooray!!!
Sady Doyle discusses certain female music artists and where they fall on the spectrum of female archetypes. On one end of the spectrum we have the virgin - who somehow still manages to be sexualized in a creepy patriarchal old-school kind of way - and on the other we have the whore, the "bad girl" who, is not just whoring it up on her own terms, but is rather internalizing anti-feminist and patriarchal views. Katy Perry, however, falls right in the middle. She embodies both virgin/whore at the same time. And I am unsure as to whether she is a) fully aware of this and makes a conscious choice to do so or b) is too ignorant and caught up in the fame/money/patriarchal society in which we live to even pick up on the hypocrisy at play here. She has a heterosexual, monogamous marriage with comedian Russel Brand that is extremely important to her, as her Evangelical upbringing has, and still continues to, play, an important role in her life. Weird, though, her song "I Kissed a Girl" seems to contradict this (as well as everything else that seems to come out of her mouth) but oh, silly me, I forgot: as long as this display of affection between two women is just a performance (one that is consistently portrayed for male pleasure/entertainment, "lipstick lesbians" if you will), one for her boyfriend who she hopes "won't mind it" because, as Doyle says, "he has veto power on her sexuality", then all is well and everyone approves.
Wrong.
This is where the point about "complexity" arises. Doyle makes an excellent point about the "complexity" that is female sexuality. On one hand, girls/women are told that we need to be "pure" because no man is going to marry us if we are those filthy "bad" girls who do naughty, inappropriate things like have orgasms and sexual intercourse. But yet, we are told simultaneously, to BE "sexy" (not sexual, just sexy) - a performance in which we must be the leading lady in order for men to want us, desire us, accept us. We "perform" solely for men. But this performance is seen as "bad", something that only "bad" girls do - a "rebellion". But as long as you aren't ACTUALLY having sex (you gotta remain to be viewed as "pure" and good - don't forget, you NEED to find a husband), and just PERFORM sex then you are A-OK. And you do it for your boyfriend. Or husband. Or male co-worker. Or that random guy standing over there. It really doesn't matter because you're not doing it for yourself anyways - you don't get to define your own body/sexuality and should never reap any sort of benefit from it. Ever.
Katy Perry is living out the complexity of the double standard set in place for women to be pure/virginal while simultaneously being the whore. And by doing so without acknowledging it is making the statement that this is "normal" (not to mention teaching the young girls who listen to her music and who idolize her that this is how they, as females, should act: don't take control of your own sexuality but rather hand that control over to the males that you will encounter in your life. Because ultimately it is they who decide your worth). And somehow I highly doubt that this is a conscious choice she is making. While the images of Taylor Swift and Ke$ha appear to have been manufactured by the media and record lables, Doyle refuses to believe that this is simply an "image" that Perry is performing - it's not her "pop star persona" - but rather her true identity and it exemplifies her beliefs of what/how a woman should be.
In my post
Katy Perry: "It's just pop!", I discuss an article in which Katy Perry is being compared to Lady Gaga. Gaga was the "bad girl" in this assessment, while Katy Perry was argued to be the "good girl":
"Ms. Stein noted that, unlike Lady Gaga — the totem to all female pop singers these days — Ms. Perry is not very threatening, obscenities and innuendo notwithstanding. “She hews to the model of a pretty girl being pretty and filling feminine roles, really while nominally subversive,” she said. “She might be winking, but the rest of her body is pretty naked while she does it.”"
This is a clear-cut example of what I'm talking about. She is "the model of a pretty girl being pretty and filling feminine roles, really while nominally subversive,". However she is not going against the norm AT ALL. She is exactly the "woman" that society wants: the pretty girl being pretty and filling her feminine roles all the while acting "sexy" (posing provocatively, singing about sex in cars and dirty motel rooms, etc.) but not sexual, being good and finding a husband, engaging in a heteronormative monogamous relationship. She is the "perfect" woman because that is precisely what a "perfect" woman is expected to be/do.
So, I completely 100% agree with Sady Doyle when she says that Katy Perry:
IS AN EXAMPLE OF EVERYTHING WRONG ABOUT THE PRESSURES ON WOMEN IN THIS OUR CURRENT ERA.
SHE JUST IS.
SHE’S AWFUL.
To bring it on more of a personal level, I too struggle with this virgin/whore dichotomy. While I fully feel in control of my own sexuality and my body, I still get that whole "Oh no, what will people think" fear when I tell someone about a sexual encounter I had. While, for the most part, I don't let a person's opinion bother me and attempt to shrug it off with a "Whatever, I am doing what I want with whomever I want and ain't nobody gonna shame me" kind of attitude, it doesn't mean that the reactions don't sting a little, especially coming from people I know personally - people whom I think a) are in no place to judge me and b) should be more empowered themselves and stop listening to this bullshit about how men won't marry women who fuck for themselves. Even more double standards at play! ARGGHHH it never ends!
On one hand, how can I blame them for thinking that way when that is ALL I hear coming from the guys around me? They love it when a woman is all over them or talks in a sexual manner, but if she acts on this then they talk about how much of a whore or slut she is or sexualize her even further. It is truly messed up.
But on the other hand, I think it's about time we, as women, quit internalizing this bullshit. It doesn't do us any good (clearly) and only gives others more control over our bodies and affects how others perceive us and how we perceive ourselves. Alana, in
a post on
fbomb, is bang on when she says:
" The slut is never the good girl in stories or movies. The slut is always Taylor Swift's enemy in her songs, the troubled girl in a family sitcom, or the simple-and-sexually-available archetype in movies. Sluts are shamed, to a great degree, by females themselves. Just ask any high school girl what her go-to insult is about another girl who stole her boyfriend, a girl who wears revealing clothing, or just a girl she doesn’t particularly care for. Women participate in slut-shaming and women-hating as much as anyone else."
I don't regret any sexual choice that I have made in my life because
I made those choices. No one made them for me or coerced me into anything. While not every encounter has been a pleasant one, I was fully in control of my own sexuality and my body, and continue to learn from these experiences.
While society is telling me to be the "perfect" woman, I am quite content being imperfect. Perfection doesn't exist people.
Katy Perry should tattoo that on her wrist as a little reminder.
