There’s a lot said recently about what women in the music business are encountering. From sexism, to the double standard of ageism, where men only get sexier with age and women get ugly and are urged to quit.
Charli XCX has spoken out on Twitter on several occasions about how women are being treated in music, especially after a Dutch radio DJ asked her if she was touching herself on air, which deeply insulted her.
Now, Charli XCX is fighting back with “The F Word And Me”, where F stands for feminism.
It’s a 42 minute documentary about being a woman in the music business. During her collaborations and work as a pop star, she tries to find out if feminism has even reached the music business at all.
The question itself is not that strange. While, in Beyonce’s words, “Girls run the world” of music at the moment, the women present themselves in such a way, you have to wonder, if they really are as much in control as they would like you to think, or are they just dancing the dance men created.
It’s an interesting documentary, in which many female artists are questioned about what they consider to be feminism, filmed from a very personal perspective. And it’s very clear to artists a lot still has to happen, but it’s also clear there are many grey areas on which no one will fully agree.
The double standard about how women look, or supposed to look, is always an interesting debate. As a woman, I look at young female stars shredding their innocent pop star image to bits, in the way Kylie Minogue, Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera and, to a certain extent, even Miley Cyrus have done (by taking clothes off). That’s empowering and a woman who’s taking charge. But, I’m fully aware that teen boys and men only care about seeing the boobs, without realizing that strong feminine message behind it at all.
Besides, if you’re a woman in an office job, you can’t do the same thing to show you are growing up and you mean business now. The rules are different for women out in a regular work force in a regular life.
Like Charli states at the end of the documentary, the topic is not an easy one. It’s layered.
The fact, however, remains, that what women burned their bras for to symbolically break free from any restrains, has allowed this generation of women to do more with their lives than get married, have babies and cook. We enjoy much more freedom. But, unfortunately, if we want a career, we still have to settle for less than men. Less money, lower positions in business, less credit or acknowledgement. Oh, and work twice as hard. There's an F word I'd like to enter here, and it isn't Feminism...
