Rolling Stone: Stevie Nicks Sees Women's Rights Slipping

[redbird]

Originally Posted by elle

tell me, how did she fight for those rights? i would like to understand what everybody is talking about when they say that. what i always see is just Ms Nicks saying about herself how she's a trailblazer for women everywhere, and then some people just repeating her words, same as several guys already did in this thread.

her exact quote about how she did it from this interview is "Nicks said they worked to change the perception of women within the rock & roll circles of the Seventies. "I said to Chris, we can never be treated like second-class citizens," she explained. "When we walk into a room we have to float in like goddesses, because that's how we wanted to be treated. We demanded that from the beginning."

you need to float like a goddess so you can get your rights? what?? sorry, i think i can have my rights without having to float. i like to stomp.

Then you stomp, you do your thing, like floating like a goddess is her thing. I don't get the distinction you're trying to make here at all. Do you think she'd tell you that you're doing it wrong? Or ... I don't understand what your concrete point is here. Do you think she's saying that women have to wear chiffon and capes in order to be strong fighters?

Rock'n'roll is an industry full of huge egos. You need to make sure your ego is given as wide a berth as anyone else's to make it clear that you won't accept being treated like a doormat. I think it is pretty obvious that that's what "floating in like a goddess" refers to. If everyone else in the room is a smug arrogant asshat, then yeah, be a diva if that's what it takes. Why the hell not. Anyone who thinks that you can fight a demanding industry without being demanding in turn is naive.

What did she do? She was a visible part of a huge rock and roll band. She wrote many of its songs, including some of its best songs, she had a successful solo career motivated by a desire to fulfill her own personal artistic needs and career ambitions even if it upset the apple cart to some extent or other. She sang in a traditionally masculine connoted genre but did not erase her femininity even though feminine things (ie ballet, fairies, blah blah blah) are considered trivial and easily dismissed.

Why on earth do you begrudge her this? Does it lessen Lindsey or Christine or John or Mick? Is it wrong for her to recognize her impact? Stevie, Ann and Nancy Wilson, Pat Benetar, Joan Jett, Patti Smith, Tina and Janis and Joni and Grace, the number of women who have managed to earn their spot alongside the far more numerous male names that get mentioned in lists of great rock'n'rollers is few, that's just a fact. Stevie is among an elite group of women, if you ask people to name great women of rock'n'roll the list is not going to get much bigger. Check any Rolling Stone special or NME or what have you. Is that all a big hoax Stevie Nicks pulled on the world, to convince them she's the be all end all? She payed big bucks to steal the "Reigning queen of rock'n'roll" moniker from someone far worthier?

Do you really think that's what she's saying here?

What in this article gave rise to your comments? The part where she said "we"? The part were she acknowledged her own heroes like Janis? From that you get that Stevie Nicks considers herself the sole single trailblazer for women? What she said was that she had to fight. Along with other women that had to fight. And she finds it unfortunate that that fight did not result in permanent gains.