AS A FEMINIST ICON
Debbie Harry of Blondie is a strong feminist icon and pioneer for women in music. She is unapologetically herself and aims to make herself happy, not others. She is unashamed to be a woman and uses her beauty and sexuality to empower herself and other women.
Harry’s photo in her high school year book
Harry as a child
At a young age, Debbie dropped out of school and moved to New York City to be an artist. She rejected the notion that a woman’s only aspiration is to marry a successful man. She wanted to be independent and find her own success. “I don’t think my parents contemplated a future for me other than marriage. I was marketed for that, I was produce for that” (Gholson, 10).
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Blondie was founded by Debbie Harry and Chris Stein in 1974. Debbie Harry has revealed that the name “Blondie” came from a man catcalling her, “Hey Blondie! How about a blow job?” Rather than allowing “Blondie” to be demeaning, she claimed the name for herself. By owning the name, she transformed its meaning into a sense of empowerment. In a 2017 interview, Debbie stated, “Right from the beginning, I definitely wanted to take a position of strength and not vulnerability. Philosophically that was always my stance and I was quite stubborn about it” (McCormick).
Blondie in 1977
Harry and Stein in 1978
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Many women in the punk scene combatted male oppression and sexism by making themselves unattractive with short spiky haircuts, wild makeup, and DIY T-shirts. This was not Debbie Harry’s approach. “[Patti Smith] has a very masculine and intellectual approach to music and performing. I don’t want to do that... Rock and roll is a real masculine business and I think it’s time girls did something in it. I don’t want to sound like a libber, but I want to do something to make people change the way they think and act towards girls” (Gholson, 12).
Patti Smith in 1975
Harry in 1976
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Harry embraced her femininity, beauty, and sexuality; and that empowered her. “Although she constantly played with images of sexy blond bombshells, there was a sense that she was doing this not to excite her audience but to please herself: you can look, but you can’t touch” (Garratt).
Debbie Harry spreads her feminist message through Blondie’s music. Their 1976 song, “Rip Her to Shreds” describes a woman referred to as “Miss Groupie Supreme”. Harry’s lyrics judge the woman for her sense of style, insinuate that she is unintelligent, and continue to call her “dull”. “She looks like the Sunday comics. She thinks she’s Brenda Starr. Her nose job is real atomic. All she needs is an old knife scar.”
Harry performing with Blondie in 1978
Harry performing “Rip Her to Shreds”
Harry has stated two interpretations of the song, both revolving around women in the New York music scene. The first interpretation of the song is that women are too judgmental of one another. “It’s so dirty and menacing. It’s what we all do when we’re getting catty – that’s what the New York scene was like” (Sullivan). The second meaning of the song is about gossip columns and the press’s exploitation of female artists. Unfortunately, her own record label gave truth to the song by issuing an advertisement, without her knowledge, of Debbie in a see-through top and the title, “Wouldn’t you like to rip her to shreds?” (Sullivan).
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Blondie in 1978
Debbie Harry and Iggy Pop
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During their prime, Blondie didn’t think of themselves as a feminist band. Guitarist, Chris Stein, commented in 2017, “I don’t know if we recognized the feminist aspects of Blondie at the time, but Debbie had her own style and it made men nervous. The same people cheering Mick Jagger and Iggy Pop could be very critical of Debbie’s overt sexuality” (McCormick).
Debbie Harry created Blondie to be her own success. She didn’t want to marry a successful man and become a housewife, as women were expected to. She wanted to make her own way through her art. “I think the strongest art comes from the strongest people, not the weakest ones. I didn’t think I was strong enough at one time, but I do now” (Gholson, 12).
Harry in the late 1970s
In a 2017 interview, Harry looks back on her decisions to become an artist saying, “I wasn’t going to be the kind of woman who raises a family and lives in the suburbs. I wanted to be my own person. That was a big transgression. I guess that’s about as feminist as you can be” (McCormick).
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REFERENCES Garratt, Sheryl. “Debbie Harry on Punk, Refusing to Retire and Sex at 69.” The Telegraph, Telegraph Media Group, 1 Mar. 2015, www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/ music/ rockandpopfeatures/11432214/Debbie-Harry-on-punk-refusing-to-retireand-sex-at-69.html. Gholson, Craig. “Blondie’s Roots.” New York Rocker, 1976, pp. 10–12. McCormick, Neil. “‘I Don’t Know If We Recognised the Feminist Aspects of Blondie at the Time’- Chris Stein and Debbie Harry Talk Life in the Band.” Independent. ie, Independent.ie, 8 May 2017, www.independent.ie/entertainment/music/i-dontknow-if-we-recognised-the-feminist-aspects-of-blondie-at-the-time-chris-steinand-debbie-harry-talk-life-in-the-band-35681186.html. Sullivan, Caroline. “Blondie – 10 of the Best.” The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 16 Sept. 2015, www.theguardian.com/music/2015/sep/16/blondie-10-of-thebest.