2015-16
Mitra FAMILY GRANT Recipient
Pretty in Pink: An Examination of European Female Punk Rock of the 70’s and 80’s through a Feminist Lens
Kaitlyn Gee, Class of 2016
PRETTY IN PUNK: AN EXAMINATION OF EUROPEAN FEMALE PUNK ROCK OF THE 70'S AND 80'S THROUGH A FEMINIST LENS
Kaity Gee
2016 Mitra Family Scholar
Mentors: Dr. Ruth Meyer, Ms. Susan Smith April 11, 2016
So, where did all the women go?
The Second Sex’s Scarcity in Punk Rock
“Some people think little girls should be seen and not heard… Well I think, Oh bondage, up yours!”
- X-Ray Spex, “Oh Bondage, Up Yours!”
From safety pinned leather jackets to Johnny Rotten’s infamous “antichrist, […] anarchist” anti-establishment lyrics, punk, at its very core, has been a rebellion.1 Punk’s origins have been widely debated, as has its definition as a music subgenre and counterculture. After all, its emphasis on accessibility, anyone’s ability and freeborn right to create anything and everything, and its rejection of labels has made the duty of any punk rock historian difficult to fulfill. It has been long past the heyday of punk, but its influence remains prominent throughout culture and society. Inspired fashion, the arrival of punk rock sub-subgenres, and post-punk music – in many ways, punk has never been more alive.
For many historians, the 100 Club Punk Festival marked the rise of punk in September 1976.2 A two day event that featured the Sex Pistols, the Clash, Subway Sect, the Damned, Chris Spedding and the Vibrators, the debut of Siouxsie and the Banshees and the Buzzcocks.3 Less than a month after the event, EMI signed the Sex Pistols whose unruly acts of violence and defiance became the latest British tabloid headlines.4 Where punk ends, however, is still a topic of debate.
There is a plethora of research on the subject: documentaries, podcasts, fan zines, magazines and even scholarly articles have detailed and analyzed just about every piece of punk rock history, minus half. It is astounding how almost every learned and not-so-
learned source has skipped over the second side. The Second Sex’sstory of punk.5 This is a paper written with the intent of writing women back into punk rock’s history.
Women were not necessarily forgotten during punk rock; merely, the focus of history’s lens has been shifted to an androcentric point of view. Of course, punk rock historians do not commit this sin alone – only in the past couple of decades have historians been exploring the fields of gender and queer studies. It’s ironic that the punk community and its study falls victim to this inherent sexism, in spite of so proudly rejecting similar traditional and confining notions of behavior. While male bands like the Sex Pistols and the Buzzcocks and the Clash are recognized with prestige for their individualism and music as key influencers of the punk movement and culture, it is understood that women were part of the punk rock movement. However, they are typecast as a part of the nightclub scenery, a leather-bound one-night-stand after a concert, and oftentimes an obstruction to success
Johnny Rotten, lead singer of the Sex Pistols, famously expressed his feelings towards women in the song, “No Feelings.” He proudly states that he has no use for women’s availability and romantic presence, declaring that if a woman pursues him, "[he'll] beat [her] black and blue okay, / [he'll] send you away."6 A woman’s romantic presence in Rotten’s life is a roadblock to his artistic development. Throughout punk culture and analysis of it, women are frequently seen as the root of a male punk rocker’s misfortunes
The legacy of women in punk is limited; today, few can name punk bands that feature women 7 To many, one name comes to mind: Nancy Spungen, who was not a performer or an artist. Spungen was Sex Pistols’ bassist Sid Vicious’s girlfriend during
the heyday and breakup of the band 8 Portrayed as a profoundly negative influence on the musicians of the American and British punk scene, Spungen’s name has been dragged through the mud. Many historians and journalists have promoted this concept in modern popular culture and media, especially in the 1986 British biopic film, Sid and Nancy. 9 Most notable, however, is Jon Savage’s description of Spungen’s role in the punk movement in England’s Dreaming. Heralded as “the definitive history of the English punk movement,” England’s Dreaming portrays Spungen as a drug-addled, troubled girl who lead to the downfall of the Sex Pistols. Interviews conducted by Savage recollect the scene’s impressions on Spungen.10 In one of Savage’s interviews, Leee Childers, the Heartbreakers’ manager, a band widely associated with heroin use, manager openly blames Spungen for Vicious’s drug addiction, “If the Heartbreakers brought heroin to England, then Nancy brought it to Sid.”11 Just as Yoko Ono is credited for the fall of The Beatles and Courtney Love to the death of Kurt Colbain, Nancy Spungen’s legacy as an interference to the Sex Pistols’ artistic development has been and continues to be a misconception.12 Immortalized in writing by historians like Savage, the inherent gender prejudice of the punk rock movement and its analysts perpetuate the idea that women were a complication if not secondary and inferior participants in the punk rock movement.
In a survey completed by Cazz Blase for The F Word’s, a contemporary British feminist blog, piece, “Too Good to Be Forgotten,” Manchester residents were interviewed to unveil common perceptions of punk, especially those surrounding women in punk.13 Nine out of ten interviewees hadn’t heard of The Slits, a prominent female punk band, but seven out of fifteen mentioned the Sex Pistols in their list of punk bands.14
Two mentioned bands that featured women when asked to list punk bands in the general sense, while a third of the total interviewees could not name any punk female performers or bands with a female member.15
The misbelief that women were absent from the punk movement is not a recent phenomenon; it began much earlier with the paucity of coverage on female bands. Ironically, many female writers attempted to contribute to the evolving movement of bands such as Siouxsie and the Banshees and The Slits, but few are ever discussed or referenced in academic historical accounts of punk.16
Only one magazine of the times took an interest in punk, Spare Rib, which ran a piece, entitled “Women’N’Punk. ”17 Spare Rib was the largest feminist magazine of the women’s liberation movement in the late 20th century.18 Challenging stereotypes and the exploitation of women, the magazine supported the debating chamber of feminism in the UK during its run from 1972 to 1993.19 Historians, academics and activists chart the objective of Spare Rib as the rise and demise of the Women’s Liberation Movement.20
“Women’N’Punk” featured music reviews of iconic female acts like Siouxsie and the Banshees, the Slits, and Blondie.21 Its interviews with the artists provide a feminist perspective on the experience of being a woman in the male-dominated punk society.22 Spare Rib’s piece garnered attention for the subculture, but punk continued to be outside the mainstream. Magazines targeted at teenage girls continued to perpetuate gender roles and sexist beliefs, especially popular magazines, Honey and Jackie 23
The Patriarchy is Everywhere and I’m, Like, Kind of Offended Sexism in the 1970’s and 80’s
“Can't decide what clothes to wear Typical girls are sensitive Typical girls are emotional
Typical girls are cruel and bewitching
She's a femme fatale
Typical girls stand by their man
Typical girls are really swell
Typical girls learn how to act shocked
Typical girls don't rebel
Who invented the typical girl?
Who's bringing out the new improved model?
And there's another marketing ploy
Typical girl gets the typical boy”
- The Slits, “Typical Girls”
Though significant strides were being made in the 1970’s such as the protesting for women’s labor rights, holding Nation WLM conferences, and opening of various shelters for battered women, and the passing of the 1975 Sex Discrimination Act, sexism was still a pillar of British society.24 Mainstream media suggests that women were a commodity – a 1972 ad in the aforementioned girl’s magazine, Honey, described how a woman ought to love: “When the time comes to tell the world you love him, take the third finger of your left hand to H. Samuel and they’ll show you how to say it beautifully.”25 Only under the instruction and guidance of a man could a woman make a proper decision, according to the mass media, and the general public believed it.
This Is the Ultimate Showdown
Punks vs. Hippies vs. the Mainstream
“Blow up your TV, throw away your paper
Go to the country, build you a home
Plant a little garden, eat a lot of peaches
Try and find Jesus on your own”
- John Prine, “Spanish Pipedream”
“When you look in the mirror
Do you smash it quick
Do you take the glass
And slash your wrists
Did you do it for fame
Did you do it in a fit
Did you do it before You read about it”
- X-Ray Spex, “Identity”
Previous to the 1980’s, feminists were heavily involved with socialism; they compared equality to the bourgeois.26 First wave feminists in Britain believed in “liberal feminism,” or equal terms with men, primarily legalistic changes. On the other hand, second wave feminism, the feminism of the 1970’s and 80’s, focused on social, economic and cultural changes.27 Both movements supported equal pay, greater representational equality, and the idea of women possessing the ability to fulfill their creative potential alongside men.28 At the vanguard of the 1960’s and 70’s women’s rights movement, were the hippies. Armed with protest songs and flowery skirts and flared denim jeans, they were determined to fight against gender roles and inherent sexism of post-war austerity.29
The hippies made significant progress in the 60’s and early 70’s. In many ways, the hippies enabled the punks, significantly giving way and paving the path for punk feminists. Noted as one of the most influential feminist writers of the second wave, Germaine Greer guest-edited a special “C**tpower” issue of the underground magazine, Oz
Published in London between 1967 and 1973, Oz was one of the first alternative underground zines to make the international scene.30 Considered wildly controversial, the counterculture magazine featured stories on abortion, war, censorship, police corruption and sexuality.31 Its fearless attacks and lampooning challenged the status quo, exposing the tensions between the conservatism of the past generation and the new social movements of the 1960’s and 70’s, particularly the hippie movement. Oz quickly became
a hallmark zine in hippie history: psychedelic designs, ideals of sex, drugs, rock n’roll, freedom of expression all contributed to the hippie aspiration to expand the mind.32
Greer’s issue included a women’s liberation manifesto, a piece on female masturbation, and instructions on how to make your own “C**tpower” bikinis. “Revolutionary women may join Women’s Liberation Groups and curse and scream and fight the cops, but did you ever hear of one of them marching the public street with her skirt crying, ‘Can you dig it? C**t is beautiful!’ The walled garden of Eden was C**T. The mystical rose is C**T. The Ark of Gold, the Gate of Heaven. C**t is knowledge. Knowledge is receptivity, which is activity. C**t is the symbol of erotic science, the necessary corrective of the maniacal conquest of technology. Skirts must be lifted, knickers (which women have only worn for a century) must come off forever. It is time to dig C**T and women must dig it first.”33
Though both punks and hippies despised the crushing conformity of society and desired to break out from cultural norms, they also despised each other.34 Punks abhorred the hippie ideal of fertility and femininity, creating their own definitions of beauty and sex.35
Through appearances and actions, female punks sought to reclaim and redefine an alternative femininity; they upset the existing symbolic binaries of sex and gender, though oftentimes unintentionally. Female punks passionately rejected the 1960’s and 70’s feminism and strayed away from society’s labels until the very end of the era when a select few began associating themselves with movements or shallowly imitated movements.36 In favor of a more individualistic and complex vision, the female punk underground wanted nothing to do with feminism, finding its rules rigid and constricting.
They didn’t care for organized protests; in fact, few punk women were involved in institutionalized feminism and its practice.37 By simply entering the male turf and “accidentally” practicing feminism, female punks created a new type of feminism and femininity, one without deliberation.
One of the Guys?
Sexism in Punk Rock
“Passion that shouts And red with anger I lost myself Through alleys of mysteries I went up and down Like a Demented train
Don’t take it personal I choose my own fate I follow love I follow hate.”
- The Slits, “Adventures Close to Home”
Punk has a reputation for gender equality38 and Pauwke Berkers, a sociologist at Tilburg University, put the rumors to the test in his Masters thesis, “Rock Against Gender Roles,” studying the Rock tegan de Rollen (Rock Against Gender Roles) festival in Urecht, The Netherlands in the 1980’s.39 Berkers also comments on the festival’s position between punk and second-wave feminism while describing the relationship between punk music and participation in the music industry, the origins of Dutch punk music, performing femininity and generational differences about feminism.40 For many of the participants in Berkers’ study, punk was generally supportive of the female participants. However, the number of female punks still dwarfed in comparison to male, signifying the movement’s gender imbalance 41 During the formative years, 1976 to 1982, the total percentage of individual punk musicians was limited to approximately 8%, and only 20%
of punk bands included one female member according to the study. These numbers differ depending on the local scenes, but the unevenness in participation was evident. Similarly, some of Berkers’ participants even recalled violent and sexist remarks during their time in the punk scene. Even though women were taken seriously as performers and break out from the “good girl” personality, women often felt sexually objectified.
Does It Come From the Devil?
The “Real” Roots of British Punk Rock
“Now all you’re thinking ‘Was it death or glory now?’
Playing the blues of kings Sure looks better now.
Death or glory, just another story?”
- The Clash, “Death or Glory”
For many post-World War II protestors, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill served as the exemplar of the ruling class.42 For the children of the 50’s and 60’s, he was a national hero, possibly more popular than the Royal Family themselves.43 However, to the new generation, his idealized image obscured urgency of the situation of the 70’s and 80’s.44 Moreover, it introduced punk as the “bourgeois demon, the harbinger of the anarchist apocalypse – just like that 1911 bogeyman” as Savage notes in England’s Dreaming 45 Similarly, like in America, widespread unemployment was a great motivation for joining the growing underground.46
London’s widening class gap fueled both the feminist and the punk movements of the 1970’s – though cheap labor was seemingly in abundance all over England, the Labour Party’s promises of socialist ideals and fortified trade unions proved to be empty.47 By 1977, under the Labour government, Great Britain had 1.6 million unemployed men and women.48 The financial disaster, social unrest and lack of trust in
government became deeply imbued within punk’s political conscience and appealed to young British punk fans, many of whom had been directly affected by the country’s unemployment problem.
Too
Much Glitter, Gag Me! Glam Music and the Anti-Glam
“My existence is elusive The kind that is supported By mechanical resources
I wanna be instamatic I wanna be a frozen pea I wanna be dehydrated In a consumer society” - X-Ray Spex, “Art-I-Ficial”
Britain’s social issues and dull pop culture scene primed for the radical reorganization punk would bring.49 Glam had been a pop enterprise in the UK – David Bowie and Gary Glitter had nine Top 20 hits by 1974, and T. Rex landed in the Top 20 thirteen times in the same period.50 Siouxsie Sioux directly referenced Bowie in commentary on the punk movement, which she claimed was not “a calculated movement. It was a complete fluke, initiated in a post glitter world where Bowie had retired and retired to look like a golfer, and a load of us were looking for something new.”51
During the 1960’s and 70’s, progressive rock introduced glam rock to the stage in Britain.52 Peter Gabriel, lead singer of progressive rock (prog rock) band Genesis, began to incorporate costumes into their performances varying from the grotesque to the whimsical.53 Gabriel then heightened Genesis’ dramatic acts, crafting various bizarre personas such as “Slipperman,” a deformed human, and “The Flower,” a character spawned by the influence of Old English pastoral mythology.54
Genesis challenged the limitation of prog rock, subsequently inspiring young tobe glam rockers like David Bowie.55 A former hippie and flower child of the 1960’s counter-culture, Bowie underwent a makeover at the turn of the decade, trading his fringed vests for spandex space age suits.56 Like Gabriel, Bowie chose to develop a plethora of alter egos, reinventing himself multiple times throughout his career.57 From Ziggy Stardust in 1972 to the Thin White Duke in 1976, Bowie incorporated his love of acting into his performance, public image and music.58
However, this theatricality turned off many of those drawn to punk rock; the artificiality felt inauthentic and fabricated to those who preferred the reality of grit, sweat and struggle.59 Punks longed to express the inner turmoil within Britain and expose the dirty underbelly.60 Similarly, “high” glam showcased image-conscious and commercially conscious brand to craft their staged fantasies, which the working class could not afford.61 Like future punk bands, Bowie tampered with societal and cultural constraints at the time, uncovering a niche for the detached world for outsiders.62 While Bowie’s safe space created a haven for outsiders like homosexuals and bisexuals of the upper and working class, the to-be punks were disgusted by mainstream music all together.63 The clichéd, formulaic songs of the Bay City Rollers and other glam rock bands like 20th Century Boy or T Rex felt untrue to the punk’s political and social unrest.64 While England struggled with heavy poverty and high unemployment, other glam rock bands and mainstream pop sang of “rockin’up…and [running] with the gang…[in their] blue suede shoes” in “Shang-A-Lang.”65 The heavy commercialization and saccharine manufactured voice of glam left a bad taste in the lower classes whose political unrest demanded to be heard. Through punk rock, they would be given a voice.
Destination Unknown Rebels Without a Cause
“
God save the Queen
The fascist regime, They made you a moron
A potential H-bomb
God save the Queen
She ain't no human being
There is no future
And England's dreaming”
- Sex Pistols, “God Save the Queen”
In spite of the profound political, cultural, and social unrest that acted as a catalyst, the punk movement had no agenda.66 Cofounder of Siouxsie and the Banshees Steven Severin once said “We didn’t have any manifesto other than that we were willfully perverse and anti-everything.”67
Punks bonded over a sense of alienation and a desire to define their own culture.68
Thus, it is only natural that women, especially those on the fringe of society, would be drawn to punk, having been isolated as an inferior gender from the superior male sex and having longed to dress and act how they wanted, in spite of social and cultural norms.
It’s Not Just a Phase, Guys – It’s Making History
Introducing the Counterculture of Women’s Punk
“Even sell her on your TV screen
This year’s model is every man’s dream
It’s all a part of the advertising scheme
You can use some people, but you won’t use me, no” - Girlschool, “Not For Sale”
Punk women were unique in their own right – some were artists, some were isolated, some were angry, and others simply bored with Britain’s bubblegum society.69
Though punk bands like the Clash sang of the struggles of the workingman and rebellion
against social norms, most, if not all, were traditional in their treatment of gender roles.70
However, the chauvinistic attitude did not intimidate women from joining punks.71
Gina Birch, co-founder of The Raincoats, after watching The Slits play in September of 1977, felt a hunger inside of her she couldn’t shake off. “When I saw [the Slits] play…It seemed so extraordinary, and so…doable somehow…Suddenly the possibility was there, and it was so, so amazing to see them, and I so wanted to be a part of it,” Birch said to Cazz Blasé for an interview in the 2010 The F-word article, “Women of the punk era.” Punk’s Do-It-Yourself culture allowed women to easily join the movement. Its accessibility inspired women to take up instruments and express themselves through music.
Not Your Typical Girls The Slits
“They say it's all right, but suspicion creeps in My nightmares don't project my dreams I can't but wonder what's feeding my screen. What's feeding my screen? (FM)
Frequent Mutilation transmits over the air, Serving for the purpose
Of those who want you to fear.
- The Slits, “FM, FM” “Of course, we were totally put in exile, we were totally sabotaged, we were totally hated, most of our reviews were of outrage, and just, ‘Ew! These girls look disgusting and they can’t play music, they can’t do anything!’” lead singer Ari-Up said in an interview with Maria Raha in Cinderella’s Big Score The Slits became the first allgirl punk band from London to be recorded but never rose to the fame of all-male bands
like the Clash, whom they opened for in 1977, or the Sex Pistols.72 To the Slits, however, they never considered themselves feminists, a label often associated with the band.73
Rather, they had a female perspective on the punk rock movement, Ari-Up described themselves as being “naturally rebellious; without being told how to be rebellious, and being naturally unconditioned…We just wanted to be females without being what females were supposed to be. We just wanted to be us.”74
The Slits’ early albums were mostly recorded live and brash and loud, similar to early punk.75 Their early songs and performances in 1977 possessed “more anger and energy than actual talent,” said Brian Cogan in “Typical Girls? F*** Off, You Wanker! Re-Evaluating the Slits and Gender Relations in Early British Punk and Post-Punk.” Throughout their evolution as musicians, the Slits continued to take a fierce, often feral attitude towards music.76
In September of 1979, the Slits released their studio album, Cut, whose album art featured all three members naked, only covered in mud and tribal skirts.77 The image of the band changed as well – they began experimenting with their look in order to set themselves apart from other women.78 To outsiders, Ari-Up was truly frightening; she was young and ferocious.79 Unafraid of exploring her sexual nature in a political sense, she oftentimes used punk clubs as an open space for questioning ideas of gender ideals.80 Her striking image of tangled dreadlocks, underwear worn on the outside of her clothes inspired fear and awe.81 Lead singer Ari-Up’s fierce, intimidating image quickly defined the band as much as its tribal drumming on the Slits’ studio album, Cut Cut featured roughly played guitar and a concentration on rhythmic structures, exploring their newfound affinity for reggae and dub.82 The reggae and dub
characteristics of the Slits’ songs differentiated themselves from other bands, creating a tribal sound. The sound and album art of Cut became the primordial scream of woman, harkening a time when the “typical girl” was wild and free.
Member Viv Albertine commented on Cut’s rhythm, “We consciously thought about getting girl rhythms into music and concluded that female rhythms were not as steady, structured, or as contained as male rhythms.”83 By creating a “female sound,” The Slits created a new space for women, one defined by their own beats, one not ruled by rules like men’s.
Cut’s punky reggae sound impressed listeners so much they often assumed producer, Dennis Bovell, played all instruments.84 A backhanded compliment of sorts, this type of conjecture only reinforces the stereotype that women could not be “true punks,” let alone play instruments and create music well, if not better than men.
Largely, the culture rejected the Slits for diverging from the traditional standards of beauty.85 “That got them really upset,” said Ari-Up, “because walking on the street, they didn’t know how we sounded. I mean, it was just the way we looked, [that] was just enough to get them crazy. And ugly, oh!...It was just like, ‘How can girls do that? How dare they,’ you know? ‘How ugly, how disgusting!’ It was really wild. And the guys got it too, but then [with] the girls, like, women, it was just too much.”86 Ironic in many ways, the idea of women rejecting fellow women for differing from social norms goes directly against the feminist belief of joining all womanhood to fight against patriarchal oppression. Similarly, it buttresses the stereotype of “catty” women, the common misconception that women cannot stand in solidarity because of their weakness to emotion.
More than anything, The Slits tore punk’s tempo down, reinventing punk to suit themselves. Thus, the Slits recreated punk and the notion of a feminist.
Fluorescent Adolescents
X-Ray Spex
“Freedom tried to strangle me With my plastic popper beads But I hit him back” - X-Ray Spex, “I Can’t Do Anything”
Similar to the Slits’ new brand of punk, X-Ray Spex embraced a new raw outspokenness. Like mainstream punks, X-Ray Spex were loud and angry, but also feminine – they were colorful and garish.87 As other bands criticized the compulsive consumption, X-Ray Spex took a satirical approach to capitalist materialism.88 X-Ray Spex spoke to the downfalls of materialism of popular culture. Lead singer Poly Styrene named herself after the synthetic polymer, disgusted with the “junk then.”89 She continued, “The idea was to send it all up. Screaming about it, saying: ‘Look this is what you have done to me, turned me into a piece of Styrofoam, I am your product. And this is what you have created: do you like her?”90 Their commentary on the excessive plasticity of popular culture would continue to be a theme throughout their career.
X-Ray Spex performed their first gig in 1977 at the Roxy. The band’s saxophonist Lora Logic said in an interview with Maria Raha in Cinderella’s Big Score, “We all liked the freedom of expression and individuality like we’d never experienced before, and which, to my knowledge, had never occurred in the music scene.” X-Ray Spex’s songs revolved around their pessimistic lyrics that provoked a strong critique of capitalism and its dehumanizing effects.91
Poly Styrene screams about the systems of power and control and the artificiality produced by such systems.92 The anger portrayed in X-Ray Spex’s songs is not a cathartic release, but the identification of an unsolvable problem in society, particularly the inherent misogyny in a commercialist society.93
Styrene refused to be a plastic woman; in X-Ray Spex’s song, “Artificial” she comments on the expectations of women in a “consumer society”:
When I put on my make-up
The pretty little mask not me
That’s the way a girl should be
In a consumer society.94
Rather than emphasizing her sexuality like Ari-Up and Siouxsie Sioux, Poly Styrene chose to refute the stereotype that young female singers must be seductive and sexually available. Thick braces and oddly shaped, neon, baggy dresses were her signature style until she swapped clothing out entirely for a big plastic bag and a shaved head, an attempt to be “cleansed” in reference to concentration camp prisoners who were raped by Nazis.95
Though their appearance was unorthodox, even for the punk subculture, X-Ray
Spex was not criticized as heavily for making “bad music.”96 Unlike the Slits’, X-Ray
Spex’s melodies were tighter and possessed an energetic, pop-like edge, making them more accessible than the grittier punk acts.97 Their neon ensembles and Day-Glo plastic shopping baskets not only served as commentary on the consumerist society but also set them apart from other punk groups at the time as a bubblegum sweet group of ferocious girls. Even Johnny Rotten, the Sex Pistols’ lead singer who terrified the press, was afraid
of Poly Styrene, a nineteen-year old girl with braces who defied the restrictive gender roles of the 1970’s.98
Because of their opposition towards oppression, X-Ray Spex has been seen as a directly feminist group in British punk.99 In spite of this, Styrene and Logic insist that they never intended to be a feminist force, rather than a band that emphasized individuality and originality.100 Unlike popular UK punk bands, X-Ray Spex utilized the space of freedom punk provided, taking a satirical, joyful approach towards anger.
Golly Jeepers! Where’d You Get Those Peepers?
Siouxsie and the Banshees
“(Should I?)
Throw things at the neighbors
Expose myself to strangers?
Kill myself or... you?
Now memory gets hazy?
I think I must be crazy
But my string snapped I had a relapse
A suburban relapse”
- Siouxsie and the Banshees, “A Suburban Relapse”
With electronic drumbeats and swooping guitar riffs that bear similarity to cinematic score, Siouxsie and the Banshees isn’t your stereotypical punk band. While bands like the Sex Pistols and the Clash were abashedly angry, Siouxsie and the Banshees were mellow; their signature developed out of fearless experimentation and untrained sound.101 The Banshees’ dissonant chords deeply influenced British Gothic bands of the 1980’s.102 Nearly ten years after the 1976 formation of Siouxsie and the Banshees, Joy Division and Echo and the Bunnymen pulled from frontwoman’s Siouxsie Sioux’s supernatural-like, haunted style that utilized traditional Gothic themes like curses, sinning and disruption of the natural order.103 Goth albums of the 1980’s focused
primarily on surreal nightmares, the banality of urban living, jealousy and obsessive emotions, love as salvation from death and despair, war and genocide, nuclear holocaust, fear of totalitarianism, alienation, abstract terror, scenes of murder and horror, domestic violence, fear, angst, paranoia and lampooning masculine power, most if not all of which Siouxsie and the Banshees touch upon in their songs.104 Similarly, the Goth lyricism was heightened by lead singers’ dramatic narrative styles, a singing technique Siouxsie Sioux mastered.105 Somehow, Siouxsie and the Banshees created an atmospheric and discomforted sonic sound - a new aesthetic 106 However, the Banshees never intended to be “punk” or “goth,” in spite of their fans’ swooning sadness and dark romanticism.107
Unlike the goth bands of the 1980’s, Siouxsie and the Banshees’ songs rarely described explicitly violent situations. Rather, they turned their lens to the horror and anxiety that boils under the mundane. In “Happy House,” the Banshees play an eerie melody as Sioux belts out disturbing, entrancing lyrics:
This is the happy house – we’re happy here
There’s room for you if you say “I do”
But don’t say no or you’ll have to go
We’ve done no wrong with our blinkers on
It’s safe and calm if you sing along, sing along, sing along
This is the happy house, we’re happy here in the happy house
To forget ourselves and pretend all’s well
There is no hell 108
Siouxsie’s cynical lyrics reflect a scathing critique of the “perfect” image of the times. Siouxsie described “Happy House” in a 1983 interview on the Dutch television show Elektron and said, “[Happy House] is sarcastic. In a way, like television, all the media, it is like the adverts, the perfect family whereas it is more common that husbands beat their wives. There are mental families really but the projection is everyone smiling, blond hair, sunshine, eating butter without being fat and everyone [is] perfect.”109
In spite of their sardonic lyrics, the band’s image played more to its disturbing, decadent melodies. Like most punk bands, the Banshees intended to disrupt and disturb in every aspect.110 Sioux’s appearance became iconic. For makeup, Sioux painted her face pale and blacked out her cold, unblinking eyes, protesting the typical “glamor” of the day.111 Her Kabuki-like mask of makeup illustrated a theatrical femininity, to which Sioux flaunted alongside vinyl fishnet tights.112 Sioux mixed sex with darkness in a Cleopatra-like sexuality, as opposed to opting for the asexually bizarre like Poly Styrene and Lora Logic of X-Ray Spex did.
Sioux and Ari-Up of the Slits flung their sexuality at the crowds, exciting and disgusting them. Sioux’s fetish clothing may have attracted crowds because of their eroticism but Sioux argues that her hypersexualized clothing functioned “to show that erogenous zones are overrated…and that tits are no big deal.”113
A few weeks before the Banshees’ debut at the September 1976 100 Club Punk Festival, Siouxsie Sioux made headlines of New Musical Express, a long-standing British music journalism magazine.114 The NME journalist, Charles Shaar Murray, published a photo of Sioux in a vinyl teddy with cutouts for her breasts and stomach with the caption, “chick in S&M drag with tits out.”115 While Sid Vicious and Johnny Rotten of the Sex
Pistols shocked Britain with their hateful, anarchist dispositions, Sioux caught the mainstream media’s eyes in Britain with her unabashed nudity.116 British society considered Sioux and all punk women as “ugly” for rejecting common beauty standards.117 It is an unfortunate truth that society’s deeply ingrained misogynistic culture would rarely “permit” women to diverge from societal norms, let alone allow those women to explore alternative ideas of femininity, especially those of a sexual nature.
Conformist culture dictated that Sioux’s nudity and fetish ensembles were an attempt to attract listeners sexually but were nonetheless another exponent of the Male Gaze. The Male Gaze is a feminist theory coined by film critic Laura Mulvey in her 1975 essay in Screen, “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema. ”118 Though the Male Gaze primarily refers to visual culture, it is very applicable to how society views any type of media today.119
According to Mulvey, aesthetic culture has the tendency to depict the world, especially women, from a masculine point of view and in terms of men’s attitudes.120
Mulvey notes that women are often assigned the passive status as being looked at, objects of attraction, whereas men assumes the counterpart of a dominant, masculine position of viewing – women are to be viewed, men are to be the viewers.121 Critiquing the media’s reaction to Sioux’s actions, one can uncover an underlying Male Gaze – society assumes that Sioux only acts to be viewed by the man and for the man, when in reality her nudity functioned as a statement against sexual repression and modesty rather than as a method of seduction.122
That same year in December, TV host Bill Grundy reacted just as any proper British viewer would – ill-prepared and without restraint, Grundy was attracted to
Sioux’s hypersexual antiglamor for all the wrong reasons.123 “In his eyes, she was either a stripper or a spank-happy dominatrix,” writes Cinderella’s Big Score author, Maria Raha.124 Sioux garnered a flood of attention from the media as a result of Grundy’s shameless flirting, once again “proving” to the media that she truly desired to be the object of desire, rather than being the victim of unwanted flirtation and harassment.125
The Banshees did not shy away from taking feminist stances on taboo topics in their music, either.126 In “Peek-A-Boo” on their 1988 album Peep Show, Sioux’s haunting voice paints the portrait of a sex worker’s turbulent life as she must tailor her submissiveness or dominance to her voyeurs and elicits sympathy, detailing the sex worker’s contempt for her patrons:
Come bite on this rag doll, baby
Well, that’s right, now hit the floor
They’re sneaking out the back door
She gets up from all fours
Rhinestone fools and silver dollars
Curdle into bitter tears.127
The enduring feminist sentiment gave a voice to the many female voices muffled in the underground.
While mainstream music opted for the typical pop love songs, Siouxsie and the Banshees played songs with bite. Sioux’s intentional irony in every action reflects the character of a new female icon, one whose every action was not for the attention of a male.
Patriarchy? That’s malarkey Simone de Beauvoir and The Other
“He is the subject, he is the absolute – she is the other.” - Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex
Though feminism was considered a radical notion during the 1970’s and 80’s punk rock movement, it was nothing new.128 Before the flowerchildren, there was Germaine Greer, and before Germaine Greer came Simone de Beauvoir.129 Beauvoir, a French writer, pioneered the field of second-wave feminism.130 Her 1949 scholarly and passionate book, The Second Sex, is a classic of feminist literature.131
Beauvoir is oftentimes affiliated with the French school of philosopher-writers of Existentialism, particularly her long-time partner, Jean-Paul Sartre.132 Similarly, her works exhibit a variety of major Existential themes, particularly one’s freeborn right to determine one’s own destiny.133 Beauvoir extends this philosophy to argue equal vocation for man and woman.134
“One wonders if women still exist, if they will always exist, whether or not it is desirable that they should, what place they occupy in this world, what their place should be,” writes Beauvoir in The Second Sex. 135 “All agree in recognizing the fact that females exist in the human species; today as always they make up about one half of humanity. And yet we are told that femininity is danger; we are exhorted to be women, remain women, become women.”136 To this, Beauvoir introduces the concept of the “Other.”137
According to Beauvoir, society dictates that woman is “the sex” as opposed to “the gender.” Woman is essentially and only defined as a sexual being.138 Woman is no longer defined, but a footnote in reference to man.139
The Second Sex insists that the Other is a common phenomenon as old as time itself.140 The duality of the Self, man, and the Other, woman, is attached to the division of the sexes.141 The sexual difference is exploited by masculine ideology to create systems of inequality, systems in which women are inferior to men.142 The concept of the Other is based heavily on Hegel’s account of the master-slave dialectic.143 Hegel, a feudal German philosopher, wrote in his 1807 philosophical work, The Phenomenology of Spirit, on the development of self-consciousness as an encounter between two distinct, self-conscious beings, the emergence of the movement of recognizing the dialectic.144 This movement inevitably is taken to the extreme in the form of a “struggle to the death,” in which one masters the other, only to realize that complete mastery is impossible because the slave is unable to offer complete submission.145
In The Second Sex, man, the Subject, is absolute, whereas Woman, the Other, is inessential.146 The predicament females find themselves in is comparable to the condition of the Hegelian Slave in that men, the Hegelian Masters, identify themselves as the subject, the absolute human type, and measure women by the standard of this human, thereby identifying them, the Slave, as inferior. However, unlike the Hegelian Slave, women are unable to join in solidarity against the oppression. While this aspect of Hegel’s philosophy is universal and has been experienced by oppressed groups throughout time, they understand oppression as a communal reality.147 Woman’s lack of concrete definition exists because of the stigma surrounding female unity. As a gender, women have no documented history, religion of their own, and unity of work and interest, in contrast to the proletariat.148 When women attempt to kindle a flame of unification, men stamp out the flame – thus there is a lack of community
among womankind and they must turn elsewhere for camaraderie Therefore they turn towards androcentric groups where they are marginalized and separated from other women.149 Women live dispersed among males, separated by physical, social, sexual, racial and economic barriers.150
Though The Second Sex argues for women’s equality, Beauvoir insists on the reality of sexual difference; however, this difference has led to inequality, ultimately cultivating subjectivity and repression 151 According to Beauvoir, women and men exist in a “primordial Mitsein,” a unique bond between the Subject and the Other based on solidarity and friendliness.152 “[However,] things become clear, on the contrary…we find in consciousness itself a fundamental hostility toward every other consciousness; the subject can be posed only in being opposed – he sets himself up as the essential, as opposed to the other, the inessential, the object,” writes Beauvoir.153 Unlike Hegel’s Slave, women are in a unique category of the Inessential Other and as Inessential Others 154
In the final chapters of The Second Sex, the goal of liberation, according to Beauvoir, is our mutual recognition of every woman as free and other.155 The liberated woman must learn the following: first, in order to be independent, women must recognize that masculinity is not synonymous with independence.156 Secondly, society and socialization create femininity.157 In order to liberate oneself, one must be aware of these truths and actively engage to counter them in the world.158 They must be allowed to discover the unique ways that their femininity engages the world and thereby dismantles the myth of woman.159
Come Together
Women, the “Other” Side of Punk
“Never try to rule another person’s life You will only lose your lovely fragrant wife, I don’t like a guy changing who he is, You are not a God and it’s not your [business]” - Viv Albertine, “Confessions of a MILF”
Beauvoir’s concept of the “Other” is comparable to the treatment of women during the 1970’s and 80’s punk rock movement. Female punk rockers were sexualized and objectified, defined only as sexual beings. However, in many ways, women in punk successfully execute Beauvoir’s decree. Though unintentional, punk served as an arena for women to explore alternative ideas of femininity, independence and sexuality. Utilizing this newfound freedom in the punk subculture, female punks rejected society’s labels and expressed their individuality and frustration with oppressive culture. Women in punk were coincidentally feminists – accidentally, they created a new brand of feminism, one driven by action through music and their own creations of anti-fashion dress. They accidentally fought chauvinism and reassured society that if “femininity is danger,” then dangerous women shall be.160 By simply bringing the existence of womankind to the spotlight and joining together in solidarity, female punks crafted a space for the Second Sex.
Notes
1. Sex Pistols, "Anarchy in the U.K.," on Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols, performed by Sex Pistols, Wessex Sound Studios, 1977, MP3.
2. Maria Raha, Cinderella's Big Score: Women of the Punk and Indie Underground (Emeryville, CA: Seal Press, 2005), [Page 64].
3 Ibid., 64.
4. Ibid., 64.
5. Simone De Beauvoir, The Second Sex, trans. and ed. H. M. Parshley (New York City, NY: Knopf, 1952; New York City, NY: Vintage Books, 1989).
6 Sex Pistols, "No Feelings," on Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols, performed by Sex Pistols, Wessex Sound Studios, 1977, mp3.
7. Cazz Blase, "Women in Punk: ‘Too Good to Be Forgotten’," The F Word (blog), accessed July 21, 2015, http://www.thefword.org.uk/2010/02/women_in_punk_t2/.
8 Jennifer M. Woolston, "“You Jealous Or Something? Huh? Oh, I Bet You're So Jealous Sweetheart”: Vindicating Nancy Spungen from Patriarchal Historical Revisionism," Women's Studies 41, no. 2 (2012): [Page 176], accessed February 11, 2016, doi:10.1080/00497878.2012.636569.
9 Woolston, "“You Jealous Or Something?," [Page 177].
10 Savage, England's Dreaming, [Page 310].
11. Ibid., 310.
12. Raha, Cinderella's Big Score: Women, [Page 68].
13. Cazz Blase, "Writing Women Back into Punk," The F Word (blog), accessed July 21, 2015, http://www.thefword.org.uk/2010/03/women_in_punk_w.
14. Ibid.
15. Ibid.
16. Ibid.
17. Ibid.
18. British Library Board, "Spare Rib," British Library, accessed April 5, 2016, http://www.bl.uk/spare-rib.
19.Ibid.
20. Ibid.
21. Su Denim, "Women’N’Punk," Spare Rib, June 1979, [Page 16-18], accessed February 13, 2016, http://www.bl.uk/collection-items/spare-rib-magazine-issue-083.
22. Ibid.
23. Blase, "Writing Women Back into," The F Word (blog).
24. Ibid.
25 Blase, "Writing Women Back into," The F Word (blog).
26 "Feminism and Democratic Renewal: What Are the Lessons We Can Learn from the History of Feminism over the Last Forty Years?," Soundings, no. 52 (September 2012): [Page 8], https://puffin.harker.org/login?url=http://go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7 CA318629431&v=2.1&u=harker&it=r&p=LitRC&sw=w&asid=456354582b745 2bfe8d04d71fb092689.
27. Ibid.
28. Ibid.
29. "The Woman Punk Made Me," in Punk Rock: So What?, by Lucy O'Brien (London, UK: Routledge, 1999), [Page 186], excerpt from Punk Rock: So What?, ed. Roger Sabin (London, UK: Routledge, 1999), http://hh7kl7za7m.search.serialssolutions.com/?ctx_ver=Z39.882004&ctx_enc=info%3Aofi%2Fenc%3AUTF8&rfr_id=info:sid/summon.serialssolutions.com&rft_val_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mt x:book&rft.genre=book&rft.title=Punk+rock%3A+so+what%3F+%3A+the+cultu ral+legacy+of+punk&rft.au=Sabin%2C+Roger&rft.date=2002-0601&rft.pub=Routledge&rft.isbn=9780415170291&rft.externalDocID=978113469 9063¶mdict=en-US.
30. "OZ Magazine Goes Digital - and the Party Continues," University of Wollongong Research Online, last modified May 8, 2014, accessed April 5, 2016, http://ro.uow.edu.au/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1485&context=asdpapers.
31. Ibid.
32. Ibid.
33. Germaine Greer, "The Politics of Female Sexuality," OZ Magazine, July 1970, [Page 10], accessed April 5, 2016, http://ro.uow.edu.au/ozlondon/29/.
34. Ibid., 187.
35. Ibid., 193.
36. Raha, Cinderella's Big Score: Women, [Page 68].
37. Pauwke Berkers, "Rock against Gender Roles: Performing Femininities and Doing Feminism among Women Punk Performers in the Netherlands, 19761982," Journal of Popular Music Studies 24, no. 2 (June 2012): [Page 160].
38 Ibid., 160.
39.Ibid.,155.
40 Ibid.,155.
41 Ibid., 160.
42. Savage, England's Dreaming, viii.
43. Ibid., viii.
44. Ibid., ix.
45. Ibid., ix.
46 Raha, Cinderella's Big Score: Women, [Page 64].
47 Ibid., 64.
48 Ibid., 64.
49. Ibid., 61.
50. Ibid., 61.
51. Ibid., 63.
52. Iain Ellis, "The Seventies," in Brit Wits (n.p.: Intellect, 2012), [Page 59], accessed April 4, 2016, http://site.ebrary.com/lib/harker/detail.action?docID=10565427.
53. Ibid., 59.
54. Ibid., 59
55 Ibid., 60.
56 Ibid., 60.
57. Ibid., 60.
58. Ibid., 64.
59. Ibid., 64.
60. Ibid., 77.
61. Ibid., 65.
62 Ibid., 67.
63 Roger Sabin, "Introduction," introduction to Punk Rock: So What? (n.p.: Routledge, 1999), 4, accessed January 26, 2016, http://site.ebrary.com/lib/harker/detail.action?docID=10054676.
64. Ibid., 4.
65. Bay City Rollers, "No Feelings," produced and lyrics by Bill Martin and Phil Coutler, on Rollin', performed by Bay City Rollers, Bell, 1974, mp3.
66. Sabin, "Introduction," introduction to Punk Rock: So What?, [Page 4].
67. Raha, Cinderella's Big Score: Women, [Page 69].
68. Ibid., 64.
69. Ibid., 66.
70 Ibid., 66.
71 Ibid., 66.
72. Ibid., 80.
73. Ibid., 81.
74. Ibid., 81.
75. Brian Cogan, "Typical Girls?: F*** Off, You Wanker! Re-Evaluating the Slits and Gender Relations in Early British Punk and Post-Punk," Women's Studies 41, no. 2 (March 2012): [Page 121], accessed August 26, 2015, http://hh7kl7za7m.search.serialssolutions.com/?ctx_ver=Z39.882004&ctx_enc=info%3Aofi%2Fenc%3AUTF8&rfr_id=info:sid/summon.serialssolutions.com&rft_val_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:journ al&rft.genre=article&rft.atitle=Typical+Girls%3F%3A+F***+Off+You+Wanker%21+R e-Evaluating+The+Slits+and+Gender+Relations+in+Early+British+Punk+and+PostPunk&rft.jtitle=Women%27s+Studies%3A+An+Interdisciplinary+Journal&rft.au=Cogan %2C+Brian&rft.date=2012&rft.issn=0049-7878&rft.eissn=15477045&rft.volume=41&rft.issue=2&rft.spage=121&rft.externalDocID=R04792498¶ mdict=en-US.
76. Ibid., 122.
77. Ibid., 123.
78. Ibid., 123.
79. Ibid., 124.
80. Ibid., 125.
81 Ibid., 125.
82 Ibid., 122.
83. Raha, Cinderella's Big Score: Women, [Page 83].
84. Ibid., 83.
85. Ibid., 84.
86. Ibid., 85.
87 Ibid., 86.
88 Ibid., 86.
89. Ibid., 86.
90. Savage, England's Dreaming, 327.
91. Jayna Brown, "'Brown Girl in the Ring': Poly Styrene, Annabella Lwin, and the Politics of Anger," Journal of Popular Music Studies 23, no. 4 (December 2011):[Page 461], accessed April 8, 2016, doi:10.1111/j.15331598.2011.01306.x.
92. Ibid., 461.
93. Ibid., 462.
94. X-Ray Spex, "Art-I-Ficial," on Germfree Adolescents, performed by X-Ray Spex, Essex STudios, 1978, MP3.
95. Brown, "'Brown Girl in the Ring,'" [Page 463].
96. Raha, Cinderella's Big Score: Women, [Page 88].
97. Ibid., 85.
98 Ibid., 88.
99 Ibid., 89.
100. Ibid., 89.
101. Ibid., 73.
102. Ibid., 73.
103. Charles Mueller, "Gothicism and English Goth Music: Notes on the Repertoire," Gothic Studies 14, no. 2 (November 2012): [Page 74], accessed April 9, 2016, https://puffin.harker.org/login?url=http://puffin.harker.org:2079/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA 373678175&sid=summon&v=2.1&u=harker&it=r&p=EAIM&sw=w&asid=160ba41580 4c20608d7619324de409be.
104. Mueller, "Gothicism and English Goth," [Page 74].
105 Ibid., 74.
106 Raha, Cinderella's Big Score: Women, [Page 73].
107. Ibid. 73.
108. Siouxsie and the Banshees, "Happy House," on Kaleidascope, performed by Siouxsie and the Banshees, Polydor, 1980, MP3.
109. "Siouxsie & Budgie Interview Pop Elektron 1983," video file, 09:05, YouTube, posted by TravisBickle1963, January 21, 2016, accessed April 9, 2016, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZAWVBCtYCk.
110. Raha, Cinderella's Big Score: Women, [Page 74].
111. Ibid., 74.
112. Ibid., 74.
113 Ibid., 74.
114 Ibid., 75.
115. Ibid., 75.
116. Ibid., 75.
117. Ibid., 74.
118. Carolyn Korsmeyer, "Feminist Aesthetics," in The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. Edward N. Zalta, winter 2012 ed. (n.p.: n.p., 2012), [Page #], accessed April 10, 2016, http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/feminism-aesthetics/.
119 Ibid.
120 Ibid.
121. Movies in American History: An Encyclopedia, ed. Philip C. DiMare (Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2011), s.v. "The Male Gaze," by Reka M. Cristian, accessed April 10, 2016, https://puffin.harker.org/login?url=http://puffin.harker.org:2079/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CC X1506300436&v=2.1&u=harker&it=r&p=GVRL&sw=w&asid=f2830a14eedbb0a08e55 5e054e2fdd5f.
122. Raha, Cinderella's Big Score: Women, [Page 76].
123. Ibid., 76.
124. Ibid., 76.
125. Ibid., 77.
126. Ibid., 77.
127. Siouxsie and the Banshees, "Peek-A-Boo," on Peepshow, performed by Siouxsie and the Banshees, Polydor, 1988, MP3.
128. "Feminism and Democratic Renewal," [Page 8].
129. Britannica School, s.v. "Simone de Beauvoir," accessed April 10, 2016, http://puffin.harker.org:2053/levels/high/article/14010.
130. Ibid.
131. Ibid.
132. Ibid.
133 Ibid.
134.Ibid.
135. Simone De Beauvoir, The Second Sex, trans. and ed. H. M. Parshley (New York City, NY: Knopf, 1952; New York City, NY: Vintage Books, 1989), [Page ixx]
136.Ibid.,ixx.
137 Ibid.,xxii.
138.Ibid.,xxii.
139.Ibid.,xxii.
140.Ibid.,xxiii.
141.Ibid.,xxiii.
142. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. Edward N. Zalta, fall 2015 ed. (2015), s.v. "Simone de Beauvoir," by Debra Bergoffen, last modified September 21, 2004, accessed April 11, 2016, http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/beauvoir/#SecSexWomOth.
143.Ibid.
144. Andrew Cole. "What Hegel's Master/Slave Dialectic Really Means." Journal
of Medieval and Early Modern Studies 34, no. 3 (2004): 577-610. https://muse.jhu.edu/ (accessed April 11, 2016).
145.Ibid.,578.
146. De Beauvoir, The Second Sex, [Page xxii].
147. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, s.v. "Simone de Beauvoir."
148. De Beauvoir, The Second Sex, [Page xxiii].
149 Ibid.,xxiii.
150.Ibid.,xxv.
151. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, s.v. "Simone de Beauvoir."
152. De Beauvoir, The Second Sex, [Page xxiii].
153 Ibid.,xxiii.
154. De Beauvoir, The Second Sex, [Page xxiv].
155. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, s.v. "Simone de Beauvoir."
156. Ibid.
157.Ibid.
158 Ibid.
159.Ibid.
160. De Beauvoir, The Second Sex, [Page ixx].
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