TL;DR spoiler-free review: a collection of essays analyzing (pop) culture and what it means to be a feminist. Roxane Gay is insightful, funny, and brutally honest. Read also: Hunger.
You’re-verbose-and-I-like-it review: I think the best compliment I could give an author is to say that reading their book makes me want to seek out more of their work. I read Roxane Gay’s Hunger last year, which led me to Bad Feminist, which will soon lead me to one of her novels.
Writing style is something to which I always pay attention because it can give the reader a lot of insight. For example, Gay occasionally writes in short blunt sentences, which I find works well to convey her frustration. She also has this interesting way of doubling back on herself to emphasize her point. Consider the following from the chapter, “How to Be Friends with Another Woman”:
Don’t flirt, have sex, or engage in emotional affairs with your friends’ significant others. This shouldn’t need to be said, but it needs to be said. That significant other is an asshole, and you don’t want to be involved with an asshole who’s used goods. If you want to be with an asshole, get a fresh asshole of your very own. They are abundant.
It is obvious, toward the end of the paragraph, that she’s frustrated, not only because this has to be said, but also because there is an abundance of assholes with which to deal. I chose this quote because it is an excellent example of how she repeats herself, but not in a redundant way. “This shouldn’t need to be said, but it needs to be said” is a poetic way of saying “things should be one way but they are another.” This stylistic choice shows up a bit in this book and a lot in Hunger and I find it so compelling how she is able to say two things while using the words to say only one.
These essays were written for a variety of sources over time and later compiled into Bad Feminist. Structurally, Gay gathers her articles under several subject headings (Gender & Sexuality, Race & Entertainment, Politics, Gender & Race, and Me). I’m always a bit torn on compilations like this. On one hand, I like that the essays are relatively short and give me a brief look into her opinion on an array of issues, but on the other hand, I would have really enjoyed a deep dive into a few specific topics. Regardless, I enjoyed this book because she is always insightful, her wit is razor-sharp, and her humour is my kind of dry.
What stays with me most is the concept of what it means to be a feminist. Gay says that she used to believe that feminists were man-hating. bra-burning, sexless, angry women and turned away from the label because she didn’t want to be identified with those characteristics. This is such a clever trick of the patriarchy; turn the movement meant to liberate women against them. Gay goes on to say things like “Pink is my favorite color”, “I read Vogue, and I’m not doing it ironically”, and “I know nothing about cars.” Do these things make her a bad feminist? Lately I have wondered what kind of feminist I am. I do not participate in community events and I have never been to a protest. This is not to say that I never would or that I am unwilling, I’ve just never sought out those opportunities. I read a lot and I have opinions. I suppose I’m a feminist but I’m not an activist. Can I be the former without being the latter? Gay says “the idea of a sisterhood menaces me, quietly, reminding me of how bad a feminist I am.” Perhaps this is another trick that we are about to fall for; if women don’t identify as feminists because they think they aren’t good enough, or they think other feminists with judge them, then they will not add their voice to the cause. Divided, we are weak, sort of thing.
All this self-reflection is to say that Roxane Gay brought me to the conclusion that she herself landed on: “I would rather be a bad feminist than no feminist at all.”
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