RIOT GRRRLS
A riot grrrl won't take shit from anyone, she is strong, independant, and seemingly invulnerable,...a riot grrl can be anyone who is tired of a male dominated or sexcist world...when it comes to music riot grrl isoften reffered to as punk and bands that represent that are bikini kill, hole, sleater kinney, babes intoyland, 7 year bitch, bratmobile, lunachics etc..its just a group of grrls that want other girls to join to fight for women rights..We have power, but we won't use it to fuck you over. Power does not mean domination. It means knowing when to fight, when to protect yourself, and how to maintain freedom within an organized, egalitarian community. We know all this shit, but we also have a sense of humor about it. Feminists can snicker too. We can enjoy watching TV shows about car crashes, reading porno mags, and playing video games with nerdy boys--and even after ALL THAT, we're still out to help everybody have good gender at the end of the day. What is good gender? It's about being comfortable in your body, having pleasure in that body, despite what tradition may tell you you're supposed to do with it. A look between your naked legs is not a look at destiny. Fuck that shit!
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Bikini Kill Zine:
WHY RIOT ?
BECAUSE us girls crave records and books and fanzines that speak to US that WE feel included in and can understand in our own ways.
BECAUSE we wanna make it easier for girls to see/hear each other's work so that we can share strategies and criticize-applaud each other
BECAUSE we must take over the means of production in order to create our own moanings.
BECAUSE viewing our work as being connected to our girlfriends-politics-real lives is essential if we are gonna figure out how we are doing impacts, reflects, perpetuates, or DISRUPTS the status quo.
BECAUSE we recognize fantasies of Instant Macho Gun Revolution as impractical lies meant to keep us simply dreaming instead of becoming our dreams AND THUS seek to create revolution in our own lives every single day by envisioning and creating alternatives to the bullshit christian capitalist way of doing things.
BECAUSE we want and need to encourage and be encouraged in the face of all our own insecurities, in the face of beergutboyrock that tells us we can't play our instruments, in the face of "authorities" who say our bands/zines/etc are the worst in the US and who attribute any validation/success of our work to girl bandwagon hype.
BECAUSE we don't wanna assimilate to someone else's (boy) standards of what is or isn't "good" music or punk rock or "good" writing AND THUS need to create forums where we can recreate, destroy and define our own visions.
BECAUSE we are un willing to falter under claims that we are reactionary "reverse sexists" and not the true punk rock sou lcrusaders that WE KNOW we really are.
BECAUSE we know that life is much more than physical survival and are patently aware that the punk rock "you can do anything" idea is crucial to the coming angry grrrl rock revolution which seeks to save the psychic and cultural lives of girls and women everywhere, according to their own terms, not ours.
BECAUSE we are interested in creating non-hierarchical ways of being AND making music, friends, and scenes based on communication + understanding, instead of competition + good/bad categorizations.
BECAUSE doing/reading/seeing/hearing cool things that validate and challenge us can help us gain the strength and sense of community that we need in order to figure out how bullshit like racism, able-bodieism, ageism, speciesism, classism, thinism, sexism, anti-semitism and heterosexism figures in our own lives.
BECAUSE we see fostering and supporting girl scenes and girl artists of all kinds as integral to this process.
BECAUSE we hate capitalism in all its forms and see our main goal as sharing information and staying alive, instead of making profits of being cool according to traditional standards.
BECAUSE we are angry at a society that tells us Girl=Dumb, Girl=Bad, Girl=Weak.
BECAUSE we are unwilling to let our real and valid anger be diffused and/or turned against us via the internalization of sexism as witnessed in girl/girl jealousism and self defeating girltype behaviors.
BECAUSE self defeating behaviors (like fucking boys without condoms, drinking to excess, ignoring true soul girlfriends, belittling ourselves and other girls, etc...) would not be so easy if we lived in communities where we felt loved and wanted and valued.
BECAUSE I believe with my whole heart mind body that girls constitute a revolutionary soul force that can, and will change the world for real.
Bikini Kill Zine 2 (1991)
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