A significant but often forgotten segment of third-wave feminism and the punk movement of the 1980s and 90s is the Riot Grrrl movement. Like many other types of feminism, Riot Grrrl developed due to an exclusion—in this instance, from the mainstream, male-dominated punk space—and evolved into a loud feminism which sought to redefine and reclaim femininity as something powerful and assertive.
Despite the core of the punk movement being anti-establishment and anti-hierarchy, sexism ran rampant. This sexism can be traced back to the 1970s and to the very origins of the movement. For instance, in 1976, the zine (a self-published magazine format) “Sniffing Glue” included the phrase “punks are not girls.” In response to being excluded from the punk music scene and tyrannized in zines, women-led collectives which wrote, printed, and distributed zines began to form, allowing women in punk to express their opinions and frustrations. By the early 1990s, these zine groups developed into bands such as Bikini Kill, who spoke to these same concerns through their music. DIY and self-publishing were a central value in these zine-making collectives, in part because of the punk movements' revolt against corporate-controlled capitalism but also as a strategy to maintain authenticity and avoid censorship.
As the movement grew and became more and more centered in the music industry, the image of Riot Grrrl and these female punk bands grew in importance. Perhaps surprisingly, the movement found power in hyper-feminine clothing—almost to an exaggerated degree. Dresses, berets, and anything pink were central to the Riot Grrrl uniform. Femininity was reclaimed as something that could be strong, angry and loud. It is also interesting to contrast Riot Grrrl with other feminist movements, as the Riot Grrrls redefined femininity as powerful by hyper-identifying with it rather than attempting to “masculinize” themselves in order to gain authority and influence.
Unfortunately, the growth in popularity posed issues when it came to maintaining that authenticity. Mass media began to cover Riot Grrrl groups but centered their music rather than their zines. Many members felt that this restrained their scale of influence and was an attempt to silence their more radical views and ideas. The hyperfeminine style which defined Riot Grrrl was quickly commercialized as “girl power.” This commodification can be identified, for instance, in the mass production of merchandise and the posting of Riot Grrrl bands on mainstream magazine covers. Many members felt that these actions highly contradicted the anti-capitalist origins of the movement. Sara Marcus, the author of Girls to the Front, argues that although the commodification of “girl power” can be argued to have watered down the movement, there is also a value in the wide reach of mainstream media: someone who would have never read a zine might still have listened to Bikini Kill on the radio.
The misogyny of the mass media also had a significant impact on watering down the movement, especially in the way that it framed certain Riot Grrrl acts of resistance. For instance, members of Riot Grrrl groups wrote political and provocative messages across their bodies in pen during performances. It was popular to see a Riot Grrl band with words like “slut” or “whore” written all over their bodies in black pen as a comment on the sexualization of the female body and an attempt to reclaim the words used to degrade women. Of course, mass media interpreted and marketed this as a mindless fashion statement by the group—because how could women ever be smart enough to intentionally create an interesting and provocative metaphor? The diminution of minority group struggles and the attenuation of their resistance attempts can be seen continuously throughout history. Preconceived ideas of (in this case) women as superficial tainted perceptions and made ridicule of an otherwise potentially powerful act of resistance.
When discussing why Riot Grrrl has largely faded out today, the focus is usually on the inevitable commercialization that polarizes the origins of the movement. What is less discussed, however, is the fragmentation of the movement and the reasons behind this fragmentation. Despite being born out of exclusion and marginalization from “male punk,” Riot Grrrl had earned a reputation for being exclusionary toward WOC (women of color) and trans women—certainly at odds with how “anti-hierarchy” the movement aimed to be. The movement was largely composed of white women and failed to consider their acts through an intersectional lens.
Although there is evidence in the zines that there was some reflection on race, very little was actively done to include women of color or transgender women. Isha Savi comments on this, reflecting on how race often overrides gender as a source of discrimination for non-white people. She also writes that acts such as writing “slut” on one's body appear as a confrontational act of reclaiming sexuality if you're white, but as a woman of colour, these acts simply affirm preconceived ideas since WOC are already perceived as hypersexual by society. Similarly, WOC are already unfairly and derisively stereotyped as loud and offensive. Centering this stereotype as a core radical characteristic of the movement again only affirmed existing biases.
The Sista Grrrl movement, led by WOC, appeared in the late 1990s as a response to this exclusion. Tamar-kali Brown, Maya Glick, Simi Stone, and Honeychild Coleman founded this space for WOC in the punk movement. Like Riot Grrrl, Sista Grrrl was as much about the political identity of punk as well as the music. One of the movement's key messages was “rock music is black music”, which emphasizes how rock originates from African-American music genres such as jazz, blues and gospel, and R&B. Sista Grrrl can still be seen in today's punk scene, most clearly in Afro-punk music.
Some Riot Grrrl bands also performed at the Michigan Womyn’s Music Festival, which intentionally excluded trans women due to their incredibly transphobic “womyn-born-womyn'' rule. Already in 1991, Nancy Burkholder was asked to leave the festival, and in the years that followed, the TERF (trans-exclusionary radical feminist) and festival cofounder Lisa Vogel refused to allow trans women at the festival. Despite activists asking bands such as Le Tigre and The Butchies to boycott the festival after this event, the bands still played. It is ironic that a movement that passionately fights against the hierarchies that don't serve them simultaneously perpetuates the ones that do. While some Riot Grrrls, such as Kathleen Hanna from Bikini Kill, were openly bisexual, the movement was largely cisgender and uninformed on queer and trans issues.
Today, Riot Grrrl groups continue to pursue assertive radical feminist advocacy through their music, zines and social media. For instance, London’s Dream Nails are famous for hexing (casting a type of spell intended to cause harm) Donald Trump before the 2016 election. The Russian band Pussy Riot have staged unauthorized protest gigs, which they have recorded and posted on youtube. Their music is anti-Putin and explicitly centers feminism and LGBTQIA+ rights. Two of the members were even imprisoned for 21 months for their activism, before Amnesty International came to their aid.
Riot Grrrl sought to reclaim and redefine femininity as loud and assertive and, in doing so, left a mark on the overlapping realms of music, social activism and feminism. DIY zine collectives remain a significant but sometimes forgotten characteristic of Riot Grrl. Self-publication allowed Riot Grrrl to remain authentic and prevented opinions critical of patriarchy and capitalism from being censored. Unfortunately, the movement has died out due in part to the commercialization of “girl power,” which undermined the original ethos of the movement, but also due to the fragmentation which arose as a response to certain groups being excluded from Riot Grrrl. This oversight speaks to the need for intersectionality in activism spaces, and we can reflect on this and use the legacy of Riot Grrrl as a reminder that ongoing efforts are needed to create truly liberating and empowering movements.
Written by Ellen Gisto.
