Laura Jane Grace (Against Me!) And Lauren Denitzio (Worriers) On Surviving In Punk
NPR Music: But before any of that, I was familiar with an essay you published a couple of years ago called “You Know What Makes Me Feel Unsafe?”, which made the rounds in punk communities online. What was going on in your life at the time that made you want to write that?
Lauren Denitzio: Actually, I was approached by the blog that published it — it was called I Live Sweat. They were interested in posting someone’s experience with sexism within the punk scene. At a certain point it became clear to me that I wanted to write more about my frustrations with people who try to say that sexism or homophobia or racism doesn’t exist in the punk scene — and how people need to acknowledge that, and be able to be called out on those things, if those elements are ever going to go away.
NPR Music: Can you give me an example of the kind of thing you were trying to draw attention to?
Denitzio: I think it’s just the feeling that, “We’re all on the same page. No one here is sexist. No one here wants to treat women or queer folks any differently.” I wanted to draw attention to the fact that that’s just not true — and even if you identify as feminist, or you like certain bands or have certain political beliefs, that doesn’t mean that you can’t screw up sometimes and say things that are disrespectful or making people feel uncomfortable. I wanted to point out those things that definitely do exist, that I think a lot of men, specifically, aren’t always thinking about.
Laura Jane Grace: You know, sexism in the punk scene — or just in rock and roll in general — is so easily demonstrated by the amount of women or queer people that you see on stage versus the amount of cis males that you see on stage. And if you have a female drummer or guitar player or whatever, and they get onstage and they shred, the response you’ll see them get is, “Oh wow, you can play pretty good for a girl.” Or even the classic cliché of the dude handing off his leather jacket to his girlfriend so he can go kick ass in the mosh pit. And those are small compared to the larger things that happen; it’s pretty all over the place, unfortunately.
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