Dear Gawker: Kiss off!

Photo: Getty Images

Sometimes Editor in Chief Aaron Hicklin wants to come play in our online sandbox, and of course we are only to happy to give him the room for a good rant:

In a takedown that stirred a veritable hornet's nest, the usually irreverent Gawker eviscerated Out's choice of Katy Perry as one of this year's Out 100 cover stars (the only straight woman in an otherwise all-gay list of 105 people). You would think we'd put Buju Banton up there.

Lawson's pique knew no bounds. Perry was "an enemy of the gay civil rights movement" he wrote, demanding to know why "this tittering dykesploitationist [is] worthy of gay hero status?" While it's a reasonable point, and one we know some of our readers are asking, what's missing in Lawson's sort-of-thesis is any real accounting for the Christian fundamentalist backlash to Perry's "dykesploitation" songs that put him on the same side as Reverend "God hates Fags" Phelps; they both think songs like this matter, rather than just being pop songs that we can dance to on a Saturday night.

Apart from Lawson's highly selective take on the Out 100 (which also includes Rachel Maddow -- who was not available on the date of our cover shoot; Tegan & Sara; Obama strategist Steve Hildebrand; gay bishop Rev. Gene Robinson; Edward Albee; Ian McKellen; Boys in the Band author Mart Crowley; and many, many others), I couldn't help being reminded of my mother, who found "Like A Virgin" so deeply offensive in the '80s.

Like Madonna, as the heated reaction to Lawson's post (15,000+ views) suggests, Perry is exactly the kind of musician who throws up a mirror to our conflicted, puritanical attitude to sex and sexuality. Thus both gay and Evangelical puritans alike consider her a menace because she doesn't play the game they need her to; she thinks kissing a girl is fun, but not life-changing, earth-shattering, or worth feeling guilty about, and that won't wash with today's separatists. For many of us that kind of uncomplicated attitude is a breath of fresh air.

For Lawson, weird punctuation and all, it came down to this: "In this world, at this time. It seems awfully... empty to me." Newsflash: pop music is often awfully empty, and people are always complaining about it. That's also its beauty (though I've met Katy Perry, and she's not the empty bubblehead Lawson paints her as; she understands the power of words). Out has been here before, of course, with covers of Mika (coverline: "Gay? Post Gay? Not Gay?") and Pete Wentz ("Yes, I Am a Fag"), two other musicians who happen to be lightning rods for suspicion and resentment. They are not supposed to muddle the waters of the vicious culture war that's still playing out in the US, even on Gawker, it seems.

Richard Lawson prefers Jill Sobule, and that's fine, but try as I might I still can't dance to her version of "I Kissed a Girl." And sometimes that's all I want from my music.

-- AARON HICKLIN

Previously > Katy's best defense

Comments

[Hambone]

What's that? You have Buju Banton presenting the award? It'll be on Gawker in a second ...

[sorry]

sorry aaron--just cuz you can dance to it doesn't mean she's someone worth celebrating in the gay rights movement or gay world...I agree with Richard on this one. Pretty tasteless and lame move to put her on the cover, no doubt fueled by a desire to sell more magazines.

[Samantha]

Wow. Just lame. Why even include women in your mag? Katy Perry's song is a slap in the face to any queer woman with a brain. Way to alienate your queer readers, Mr. editor-in-chief.

[Gemma Edgar]

Your response is a little confused. You mock Lawson for thinking the song is worth interrogating, stating that he 'think[s] songs like this matter, rather than just being pop songs that we can dance to on a Saturday night'. According to you, there is no reason to bother unpacking the song because, 'pop music is often awfully empty'. Fine, if that's your point. But it isn't. Because you then describe Perry as being 'exactly the kind of musician who throws up a mirror to our conflicted, puritanical attitude to sex and sexuality', pretty serious stuff, and you think this makes her work, 'a breath of fresh air'.

You can't have it both ways. Either the song should only be judged on its dancing merit, or people should be able to interrogate its content. And by naming her one of Out magazine's 100 cover stars, surely you are suggesting people do more than just dance.

[Katherine]

Hi Gawker,

Thanks for articulating why Katy Perry's song shouldn't be such a big deal. I'm an 18 year old college student and I like "I Kissed a Girl" as the tongue-in-cheek, catchy pop confection that it is. I don't want to offend anyone, but most of the gay people who lambaste this song seem to be somewhat older. Most people around my age just don't seem to care or think that kissing a girl is anything to make a fuss about.

[Daniel]

This "rebuttal" almost deliberately ignores Richard Lawson's points, which are, in fact, entirely valid. At best, Katy Perry merited a throwaway mention in the Out 100 issue -- but the cover? Really? As Richard wonders, "Was 'I Kissed A Girl' really popular music's most salient commentary on homosexuality this year?" But beyond that -- was it this year's most salient commentary in the world at large?

No one's arguing that dancing on a Saturday night isn't fun. But at this particular historical moment, it's in remarkably poor taste to elevate Katy Perry to cover status. Out needn't be The Advocate, but give us a break. I have a hard time believing there are any lesbians adopting "I Kissed a Girl" as their anthem at Prop 8 protests. And even though the issue went to press before the election, this shitstorm was a long time in the making and should have been anticipated.

Very poor judgment was exercised here, and your readers have every right to be offended. To justify it by appealing to Saturday night dancing is -- well, frankly it's as trivializing as the song itself. It's the Louis Vuitton ad sandwiched between articles about recession and layoffs -- bloodless, escapist, and dangerous to those people who conceive of gay rights as something greater than the right to shake one's ass with head buried firmly in sand.

[David]

Katy Perry is totally unimportant to the gay community. She's not the issue. The issue is you didn't pick any of our queer sisters to be on the cover, and you hardly picked any to be in your magazine.

If you want to run a pop music magazine, then run a pop music magazine.

[amy]

i get what hicklin is saying. it's a catchy dance-pop summer anthem. fine. include perry in a list of fun pseudo-queer dance hits. but when you're attempting to run a magazine that targets the LGBT community and you run an issue on the most relevant LGBT personalities of the year, and the only woman you put on the cover is a straight pop-tart who sings about drunken bi-curious exploration with lyrics that don't really represent a positive portrayal of legitimate girl-on-girl action, that's when i have a problem with things.

Out is supposed to be an LGBT publication, meaning it is not specifically targeted towards gay men. but you'd never know it based on their history and especially not by this issue. if you want to publish a magazine for gay men, by all means, go ahead. but don't pretend you're doing lesbians and bisexual women any service by including barely more than 20 women out of over 100 individuals and by not including any queer women on your cover (in this issue or ANY issue this year).

[amy]

and to katherine, i am a college student who, while i appreciate the sugary fun that is "i kissed a girl" i have a problem with it's message. i don't think bi-curiosity is to be demonized, but i do think that kissing a girl while you have a boyfriend is still cheating and pretending that it isn't demeans lesbian relationships. not to mention the line "it's not what good girls do". if it comes on in a club, i'm more than likely to shake my ass, but i'm not marching around singing it's praises either.

and for hicklin, just because i do find parts of perry's song offensive (and her other single UR so gay completely offensive. not only because it promotes using the term as derogatory but also because, quite frankly, in what world is environmental consciousness and driving a hybrid gay?) does not put me on the same team and phelps. i'm not going to embrace a song simply because it pisses off the religious right. from my perspective, the song and it's lyrics are in the centre, a place which is preferable to phelps' side of things considering it represents SOME form of queer visibility, but not quite up to my ideal standards of positive representations.

while i'll always be glad to see lesbians and bisexual women, and yes, even bi-curious women potrayed in the media and pop-culture, i'm not willing to sit back and settle with portrayals of lesbianism as a phase, something done for male attention, or something that goes hand in hand with serial killers, sluts and an obsessively maternal instinct to merge and start in vitro 12 minutes into the relationship. this day in age, it's not simply a matter of representation but of fair and accurate representation. and not only during sweeps.

/rant.

[Michael]

"Perry is exactly the kind of musician who throws up a mirror to our conflicted, puritanical attitude to sex and sexuality." Come on, Aaron. Even you know that's a stretch. Katy Perry is no Madonna (even if Madonna, sadly, loved "UR So Gay"), and to compare the gay anger towards Perry to Fred Phelps is both disingenuous and disgusting. I was really disappointed by the cover, but now I'm pissed. I sense a new era of gay radicalism coming, and, pardon the pun, Aaron, but soon YOU'LL be out.

[Concerned]

"I hope you hang yourself with your H&M scarf
While jacking off listening to mozart
You bitch and moan about LA
Wishing you were in the rain reading Hemingway
You don’t eat meat
And drive electrical cars
You’re so indie rock it’s almost an art
You need SPF 45 just to stay alive

(CHORUS)
You’re so gay and you don’t even like boys
No you don’t even like
No you don’t even like
No you don’t even like boys
You’re so gay and you don’t even like boys"

Really? You really think that people will hear this song as "just [a] pop song that we can dance to on a Saturday night?" Because that's a song from the same fake bisexual who brought you "I Kissed A Girl just so that boys would pay attention to me." A++++++

[Lane]

It's not that I have a problem with Katy Perry's songs (the girl knows how to market: imagine how poorly that terrible pop CD would have sold had it not caused such a fuss?) it's like everyone else said: it demeans the fact that I -do- kiss girls and enjoy it, I don't do it for the attention of boys, I don't do it because I'm curious, I do it because I actually -like- girls. I actually love girls.

Are you really a hundred-percent behind refering to women kissing women as just an 'experimental game?' Because if you are, you really ought to re-evaluate your position as a representative magazine for the -whole- GLBT community.