Fashion for Writers

(Edit: MIA in Jeremy Scott at the recording studio from bonafide-hustler)

So grossed out by the NY Times Magazine cover article on MIA, and so grossed out by all the articles I’ve read so far by Lynn Hirschberg, which seem to be of the ‘LET ME TAKE DOWN THIS FINE LOOKING FEMALE WHO IS CULTURALLY RELEVANT RIGHT NOW AND MAKE HER SEEM PATHETICALLY PUERILE AND VACANTLY DESPERATE FOR ATTENTION AND CONTROVERSY’ genre.

It’s not that it’s a cultural tragedy to take down a musician like M.I.A (except it is because she’s fucking great!) but it’s the underlying assumptions in this article that are making me want to spank the NYT’s and Hirschberg’s bunged up bunghole. Here are just a few of those assumptions:

1) If you dare speak out against poverty, against oppression, against racism and injustice then you better fucking be living in a shitty-ass, tiny apartment with rat turds all piled up in a corner. At least that’s the only conclusion I can draw when the article takes such pains to make sure we are aware that M.I.A, or Maya, “moved to Los Angeles from New York, buying a house in very white, very wealthy Brentwood, an isolated and bucolic section of the city with a minimal history of trauma and violent uprisings.”

And where does the writer of this article live? In a crowded and ugly section of the city with maximum history of trauma and violent uprisings? Where do the readers of the NY Times magazine live? In horrible, run-down neighborhoods choked by poverty and rampant shootings every week? Why does it draw our ire and outrage when we find out that someone who we thought was poor and came from a hard-knock life is actually, GASP, NO LONGER POOR. Where’s the fucking gasp for people who grew up privileged and–GASP–are still privileged?

2) If you dare bring awareness to any kind of political struggle, or try to be politically active at all, then you better be spending all of your time fighting injustice and being serious and NEVER EVER EVER EVER care about superficial things for even a minute. (Only people who are politically apathetic can get away with being superficial, because we reward people for their political apathy by not holding them up to the same high standards we hold anyone who is politicized or becoming politicized.) Here Hirschberg makes sure to draw attention to the gourmet fries that M.I.A is eating (ORDERED FOR HER BY HIRSCHBERG!):

Unity holds no allure for Maya — she thrives on conflict, real or imagined. “I kind of want to be an outsider,” she said, eating a truffle-flavored French fry. “I don’t want to make the same music, sing about the same stuff, talk about the same things. If that makes me a terrorist, then I’m a terrorist.”

Thanks for using your sleezy and bromidic writing tricks to draw out what a freaking hypocrite M.I.A is for both wanting to be an outsider and eating a truffle-flavored French fry. On the most basic level, this is offensive to me because it completely denies the right that all people have to be complicated, weird, and contradictory. Haven’t we all yelled at someone we love? Pursued the profound alongside the superficial? There’s so many more examples. An example: is it really so atrocious to come home from a protest in the streets and think, Okay, so what should I eat for lunch and where should I go dancing tonight? Or must we think: Okay!  Now what important, political-social issue will I struggle fiercely against next?

I think on a deeper level, the implications of this article are disturbing to me because they express a very common view: that political activism is something only incredibly serious and morally upright people do. And anyone who dares to express political or radical views, anyone who calls themselves an activist better be completely perfect and never allow themselves any iota of privilege or wealth or comfort or selfishness, otherwise they’ll be heavily criticized and belittled for trying to express any political views and expressions of humanity. Which not only makes it very unattractive to be politically active, but it also excuses the rest of us from having any obligation to educate ourselves and take action. It’s an insidious form of psychological reassurance, because it elevates the notion of ‘political activism’ to something that is reserved for the saintly, the spectacularly selfless and devoted like Martin Luther King or Gandhi, both of whom have been mythologized into angelic warriors so that the rest of us can think: well, of course no one expects me to sacrifice on the level of someone like MLK.

Political activism is for everyone–flawed people, self-absorbed people, immature people, mature people, artists and philistines and intellectuals and sensualists and materialists. People who do good in the world are not saints. They’re normal, flawed people, and what that means for those of us who don’t give a shit is that doing good is not some special, holy activity reserved for the amazingly beneficent (aka some kind of Mother Theresa figure,) but in fact everyone (no matter how flawed and selfish) has an obligation and duty to do good, to educate oneself, to take part in struggles against oppression, and one cannot be excused of this obligation because one does not possess the correct moral character.

Another side note: WHY IS IT THAT ANYONE WHO ADVOCATED FOR ARMED STRUGGLE IS ALWAYS DISMISSED AS JUST A RABBLE-ROUSER? Are we too scared to accept that someone might actually have a valid, thought-out, judicious reason for supporting armed struggle or must we believe only immature, shallow, attention-seeking people would ever advocate for violent resistance, LEST OUR MORAL UNIVERSE BE COMPLETELY SHATTERED?

3) Finally, this last assumption is annoyingly fashion related–and I had the same problem with An Education–ANY WOMAN WHO CARES ABOUT CLOTHES AND FASHION CANNOT POSSIBLY BE INTELLIGENT OR THOUGHTFUL OR ANYTHING OTHER THAN SHALLOW AND MATERIALISTIC! Hirschberg devotes pages and pages to MIA’s sartorial choices, framing her fashion choices in the context of extravagance, or in the context of wanting to create shock value to gain publicity and attention. Well, just like in an An Education, it’s an anti-feminist stance to take, and what’s more, it’s an ANTI-WOMAN stance to deny women the expansiveness and the right to be interested in fashion and still be smart and capable and serious when seriousness is called for (and playful when playfulness is needed.) The article ends on a clothing note:

She [M.I.A.] spotted a tiger costume, complete with whiskered hood, hanging next to an orange sari. “Look at that tiger!” Maya said. “I could wear that at the photo shoot tomorrow!” She paused and considered the implications of dressing up as a tiger. “It’s probably too much,” she said finally. “It might seem like I was making a joke.”

And so what if she was? Can’t women be funny and provocative and thoughtful and engaging and profound all at once? (See: American Able project.)

There’s so much more to critique about this article–unfair expectations for artists, unfair expectations of authenticity for people of color, terrible terrible prose writing, women on women take-downs, zero comprehension or empathy for the blurry divisions between performed identity and whatever shred of sacrosanct private self we can still safely possess, & more more more but not from me, at least not now.

♥

Now for some SHALLOW CLOTHES TALK (don’t worry, I’m completely shallow in every way so there’s no need to judge me on the same terms that Hirschberg’s article judges M.I.A.)

I love this dress! It’s named after Tieka’s blog, Selective Potential, which I also love.

Dress from Modcloth; vintage belt from my moms; 90s open-toe shoesies from Etsy (I think); bracelet and little gold pin from nice people.

Love, Jenny