Member Since: 4/28/2012
Posts: 37,654
|
NYM: "What's the point of Katy Perry, even?"
Quote:
What Is the Point of Katy Perry, Even?
Katy Perry has recently announced plans to campaign for Hillary Clinton. Given that we're in the midst of one of the most openly feminist eras of the past three decades, this news isn't so hard to parse. After all, outspoken superstars like Beyoncé and Rihanna and Nicki Minaj and Taylor Swift dominate our stages and screens, offering their assorted flavors of pop empowerment and complicated personal narratives to the masses.
But when you pan from these reinvented, super-empowered lady superheroes to Katy Perry, the picture becomes far less threatening and explosive. Because Katy Perry never changes. Her brand is the very essence of reassuring, non-threatening stagnancy. She encapsulates that remaining, silent majority (It never goes away! Don't fool yourselves!) that doesn't like to be challenged at all, ever, for any reason — not by women, not by music, not by the weather, not by anything. Where Beyoncé pushes us to accept feminism and strong, assertive women (with a faintly wicked twist), and Taylor Swift pushes us to embrace vulnerability and femininity (with some emotionally volatile undercurrents), Katy Perry pushes such avant-garde, high concepts as teenagers, horny; California girls, awesome; aliens, weird; and kissing girls, actually kinda nice.
If you think about it, even the most ludicrously manufactured pop stars have at least one or two hints of inner contradiction to them. That's what makes them interesting. Madonna was virginal but aggressively dominant. Britney was a little girl on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Taylor Swift undercuts her Skipper-doll-in-day-wear-separates exterior with lyrics about rage and being crazy (not like a fox, either). We may not love any of those artists but we believe in their real and in their fake (just as important!). They battle themselves. They're trying hard. They're complex.
Katy Perry is as conflicted and complex as a pumpkin-spice rug-and-room deodorizer. She doesn't have a look. She never changes. The Katy Perry of 2010 is the same as the Katy Perry of 2015. Her hair color is different here and there. That's it. She wears tight, glittery, rainbow-colored dresses and black eyeliner. Always and forever a Super Star Barbie circa 1988.
Her music is pragmatic pop, no more, no less. It's the sound of shopping for cool shoes at a giant mall. It's the sound of eating French fries in the food court with your boyfriend, the one with the nice eyes who has nothing to say beyond the fact that he likes your butt. Katy Perry's music is all about carefree lingering within the boundaries of the male gaze.
Katy Perry is Mariah Carey without the amazing voice or the bubbly script written in a glitter pen. Katy Perry is Britney Spears without the dance moves and the natural bubbly appeal and the nervous breakdown. Katy Perry is Kate Bush without the everything.
So while we may hope for the best for Clinton, Katy Perry can only serve as a helpful reminder of what happens when all of the bluster and the pulpit-pounding die down. Because like every retrogressive, subtly anti-empowerment movement to gently but steadily erode the hard-charging swagger of mainstream feminism before her, Katy Perry represents the status quo. Marilyn Monroe, without the second-guessing and the darkness. Sandra Dee, without the alcoholism. Katy Perry reminds us that all of the progress we've made could still disappear into thin air at any moment. Her steady, uncomplicated candy-coated persona, her lady sound that never steps on any toes, offer a safe place to hide out until the storm passes and everything goes back to the way it was before.
|
x
Although a bit harsh, I do believe they have somewhat of a valid point.
Edit: Character count from article included in OP: 3663
Character count from article not included in OP: 4186
|
|
|