My mom was a housewife, and wasn't somebody that people would think of as a feminist, and when Ms. Magazine came out we were incredibly inspired by it. I used to cut pictures out of it and make posters that said, "Girls can do anything", and stuff like that, and my mom was inspired to work at a basement of a church doing anti-domestic violence work. Then she took me to the Soidarity Day thing, and it was the first time I had ever been in a big crowd of women yelling, and it really made me want to do it forever.
Kathleen HannaI felt it was really, really important, not just in the vein of feminist erasure or whatever but also just as an artist that I honored my work.
Kathleen HannaMy mom and I had secret from my dad that we didn't think we were stupid, that we didn't think we needed feminism to be explained to us.
Kathleen HannaI've always thought that "punk" wasn't really a genre. My band started in Olympia where K Records was and K Records put out music that didn't sound super loud and aggressive. And yet they were punk because they were creating culture in their own community instead of taking their cue from MTV about what was real music and what was cool. It wasn't about a certain fashion. It was about your ideology, it was about creating a community and doing it on your own and not having to rely on, kinda, "The Man" to brand you and say that you were okay.
Kathleen HannaI always get โWhatโs wrong?โ or โLighten up.โ Half the time, when guys tell me to smile, Iโm not even frowning, Iโm thinking! Then Iโm like, Oh! Some men donโt want women to think! Do they all have walkie-talkies? Are they all in this together? Like, โOK, sheโs thinking, someone say something. Sheโs reading, go distract her.โ It starts feeling like that sometimes, doesnโt it?
Kathleen Hanna