By Zoe Walsh

“I mean it’s hard enough to be a girl in a band doing sound-checks in all-male settings, but having the ‘bitch’ label proceed me to nearly every club got really tiring.” -Kathleen Hanna, former singer of Bikini Kill.

            Despite punk rock bands of the 70’s being formed to sing and scream about injustice everywhere, many men of the movement were still quite sexist to their female counterparts. In 1976, the punk zine Sniffin’ Glue wrote that “Punks are not girls,” (Hickson). The alternative music scene was still male-dominated, after all. Many women at underground shows experienced harassment while simultaneously not being respected as musicians in their own right. What else is there to do, other than gathering up other women and creating your own space full of equality and activism? The sexism and constraints of male-dominated punk spaces led to trailblazing women in Riot Grrrl bands such as Bikini Kill shoving aside social expectations to unite women across the world and create a lasting impact upon alternative music and feminist ideas.

Origins of Bikini Kill

            Kathleen Hanna, Kathi Wilcox and Tobi Vail met at Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington. They were all frequent concert-goers in the Seattle music scene, which gave birth to famous alternative and grunge bands like Nirvana, Alice in Chains, Soundgarden and Pearl Jam. During this time, women in this music scene had already started to try and confront sexism by creating self-made zines. Drummer Tobi Vail had created Jigsaw, which highlighted the punk scene and feminist commentary.

            Inspired by activism and love of music, these three joined up to create Bikini Kill in October of 1990 and recruited guitarist Billy Karren for their band. They also created a zine of the same name to promote their band. Their time spent together was ripe with political activism, media stunts and abrasive feminist music. The band disbanded in 1998, but joined together several times to go on tour and perform at benefit concerts.

            Bikini Kill was formed as an exigency for women’s liberation and alternative spaces. The state of sexism and harassment within underground music scenes and the world in general inspired the band to link up and try to enact social change. At their shows, Bikini Kill often let women come to the front as a safe space from moshers and harassers. Frontowman Kathleen Hanna often would physically remove male hecklers from her shows as well. She remarks, “Guys would come to yell really horrible stuff, call me all kinds of names, sometimes be physically violent. We played clubs that didn’t have any security. People could get away with a lot of shit, and if I wanted to get someone out, I had to physically do it myself,” (Hanna, 2014). It was worth it, however, when female fans came up to relate to Bikini Kill’s music and feminist views. “I just wanted to make sure other girls found out about feminism,” Hanna says.

The Riot Grrrl Subculture

            Riot Grrrl was not just a style of music—it was an entire subculture and lifestyle. Feminist zines made by members of the movement helped to create a network of women across the country that were involved. According to Jessica Rosenberg and Gitana Garofalo of the academic journal SIGNS, “girls held conventions where Riot Grrrls met and exchanged zines, bands performed, and workshops were held on topics such as eating disorders, rape, abuse, self-mutilation, racism, self-defense, and zine production,” (1998). Bikini Kill’s audience was young girls and women across not just the nation, but the world. They spoke out to draw attention to these issues and to influence other women that they themselves could enact social change.

            The members of Bikini Kill established a Riot Grrrl manifesto which helped to outline some of the movement’s beliefs. In their declaration, it claims that “viewing our work as being connected to our girlfriends-politics-real lives is essential if we are gonna figure out how [what]

 we are doing impacts, reflects, perpetuates, or DISRUPTS the status quo,” and “we recognize fantasies of Instant Macho Gun Revolution as impractical lies meant to keep us simply dreaming instead of becoming our dreams AND THUS seek to create revolution in our own lives every single day by envisioning and creating alternatives to the bullshit christian capitalist way of doing things,” (Bikini Kill). This manifesto helped to solidify Bikini Kill as definitive pioneers of the Riot Grrrl subculture.

            This subculture also helped to reclaim women’s femininity. Often, frontwoman Kathleen Hanna would dress up in dresses and skirts, before removing her top and revealing cutting comments like “KILL ME” or “SLUT” written across her chest. (Rolling Stone, 2001). Other Riot Grrrl bands dressed similarly while having a punk musical style. Many of these feminist bands also played for political shows. In 1991, Bikini Kill performed at the Pro-Choice Rally in Washington, D.C before the Planned Parenthood v. Casey trial (Wikipedia). Many members of these bands also volunteered in spaces such as women’s shelters and at conventions, showing that activism was a part of their lifestyle and not just symbolic ideas.

            The underground music scene, while quite politically active, could often be limited to the people that would attend those shows. This was a small percentage of usually younger people which limited the ways in which political ideas and commentary could be spread. A remedy to this constraint were zines, which became irrevocably intertwined with counterculture movements. Do-it-yourself fanzines were an incredibly important part of Riot Grrrl and third-wave feminism . Zines are defined as “non-commercial, non-professional, small-circulation magazines which their creators produce, publish, and distribute by themselves,” (Duncombe, 1997). Feminist zines like Chainsaw, Slant, Jigsaw and Bikini Kill helped to spread political commentary and discussion of taboo topics. Some also used languaging tactics within their zines; using slogans or a catchy phrase to “communicate a key idea or theme one wants to associate with an issue, group, product or event,” (Stewart et al., 153, 2012). “Revolution Girl Style Now” was a common one used by Bikini Kill; later it became one of their album titles. Part of the attraction of zines is how easy they are to make and pass around. Sociologist Kimberly Creasap notes that “unlike research papers, zine style is decidedly informal. Images are hand-drawn or cut-and-pasted by hand. Essays, poems, or confessional stories might also be hand-written—or typed with drawings framing the paragraphs,” (2014). Another selling point of zines is the fact they cost little to nothing to make and are usually never sold. This provides academic thought, political commentary and fan culture free of paywalls and prices found in academic journals and novels. Thus the zine medium as a resource is able to disseminate information easily and quickly throughout different social groups.

Song Analysis- “White Boy”

            While “Rebel Girl” is no doubt Bikini Kill’s most recognizable track, their song “White Boy” is a cutting glimpse into rape culture and victim-blaming. Off of their joint album Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah with fellow Riot Grrrl band Huggybear, this song was released in 1994. The song starts off with an audio recording of frontwoman Kathleen Hanna interviewing an unidentified man. He claims, “the way they act, the way they— I, I can’t say they way they dress because that’s their own personal choice. But some dumb hoes, slut rocker bitches walking down the street, they’re asking for it. They may deny it, but it’s true.” This recording emphasizes how many men view rape and assault as the fault of women-due to their clothes, sobriety or attitude. The pervasive attitude of victim-blaming persisted even into alternative subcultures like punk and rock music.

            The rest of “White Boy” is from the perspective of a victim. In verse one, Hanna sings:

 It’s hard to talk with your dick in my mouth

I will try to scream in pain a little nicer next time.

            Hanna sardonically comments on how it is hard to say no when being assaulted. There is also reference to the expectation of being the ‘perfect victim’, which forces women to cater to male needs and emotions despite being in pain or traumatized. The chorus consists of:

White boy

Don’t laugh

Don’t cry

Just die!

The first three lines are sung softly by Hanna, building up to a crescendo with a scream emphasizing “Just die!” Male perpetrators of sexual assault often minimize their actions by laughing or crying performatively; rapist Brock Turner laughed at his victim after two bystanders pulled him off of her (Levin, 2016). Bikini Kill’s anger at injustices like these is clearly seen in Hanna’s screaming lyrics. Within the second verse we see these two lines:

I’m so sorry if I’m alienating some of you

Your whole fucking culture alienates me

 These lyrics are a clear indicator of how women in punk and alternative subcultures feel. Since the 70’s women in this movement had been seen only as band groupies and fans, and not as agents of change or idols they could be.

            “White Boy” is definitely a punchy song, full of expletives and yelling. It grabs the listener’s attention and yet is still catchy enough to be sung. Riot Grrrl and other social movements have used music as a way to spread their ideas further than sweaty basements and concert venues. Songs like these “give persuaders a poetic license to challenge, exaggerate and pretend in ways that audiences would find unacceptable, unbelievable or ridiculous if spoken or written in prose,” (Stewart et al, p.155, 2012). The swearing and screaming would be found crude by the general public if Bikini Kill had spoken these lyrics as a speech, but combined with punk rock instrumentals, these lyrics create change. The butterfly effect of songs is huge, as it often creates echoes of social justice for years to come even when bands are not together or the movement is over.

Conclusion

Due to the mainstream media and commercialization of the entire Riot Grrrl movement, it was short-lived, only lasting until the mid-to-late 90’s. Many of the members within the scene felt they had been mislabeled by the media. Several women felt that mainstream news outlets like Seventeen and Newsweek deliberately misrepresented their ideas in an attempt to trivialize the movement. Sharon Cheslow of Chalk Circle commented, “There were a lot of very important ideas that I think the mainstream media couldn’t handle, so it was easier to focus on the fact that these were girls who were wearing barrettes in their hair or writing ‘slut’ on their stomach,” (EMP, 2011). Kathleen Hanna even called for a media blackout at one point in time due to the pressures of nationwide attention. Eventually, many of the formative Riot Grrrl bands broke apart and went their separate ways.

Bikini Kill is not forgotten to the throes of time, but they are nowhere near as popular as bands like Nirvana. Nevertheless, they have made their impact upon alternative music and feminism— in ways other than their songs as well. Kathleen Hanna was the one to inspire Nirvana’s most popular song “Smells like Teen Spirit” after she wrote “Kurt Cobain smells like Teen Spirit” on his bedroom wall after a party. Riot Grrrl bands such as Bikini Kill, Bratmobile, Huggybear and Sleater-Kinney paved the way for later feminist bands such as Mommy Long Legs, Teen Vamp Army and Amy and the Sniffers. Undoubtedly, Bikini Kill helped to blaze a trail for not only female artists but for female fans as well, giving everybody a space to sing, cry, scream and dance.

 

 

References

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Chidgey, R. (2012). Hand-Made Memories: Remediating Cultural Memory in DIY Feminist Networks. In E. Zobl & R. Drüeke (Eds.), Feminist Media: Participatory Spaces, Networks and Cultural Citizenship (pp. 87–97). transcript Verlag. http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv1wxr2f.8

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Creasap, K. (2014). Zine-Making as Feminist Pedagogy. Feminist Teacher, 24(3), 155–168. https://doi.org/10.5406/femteacher.24.3.0155

Duncombe, S. (2008). Notes from Underground: Zines and the Politics of Alternative Culture (2nd ed.). Microcosm Publishing.

Experience Music Project. (2011, June 26). Riot Grrrl Retrospective: What Got Lost. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WffxLd6zoyI

Hickson, A. (2021, April 17).The Era of Punk-Fueled Feminism: Riot Grrrl. Our Era Magazine. https://www.oureramag.com/archive/riotgrrrl

Rosenberg, J., & Garofalo, G. (1998). Riot Grrrl: Revolutions from within. Signs, 23(3), 809–841. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3175311

Stewart, C. J., Smith, C.A. & Denton, R.E. (2012). Persuasion and social movements. Waveland Press.

Wald, G. (1998). Just a Girl? Rock Music, Feminism, and the Cultural Construction of Female Youth. Signs, 23(3), 585–610. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3175302

Wikipedia contributors. (2024, November 8). Bikini Kill. In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 16:30, March 20, 2025, from https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bikini_Kill&oldid=1256056119

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