Kathleen Hanna
Kathleen Hanna
Kathleen Hanna is an American musician, feminist activist, and punk zine writer. In the early-to mid-1990s she was the lead singer of feminist punk band Bikini Kill, before fronting Le Tigre in the late 1990s and early 2000s. In 1998, Hanna released a lo-fi solo album under the name Julie Ruin and since 2010 has been working on a project called The Julie Ruin...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionRock Singer
Date of Birth12 November 1968
CityPortland, OR
CountryUnited States of America
I don't like being in the service industry and having to deal with people yelling at me all the time. McDonald's was the hardest job I ever had - so I have a lot of respect for people who work in the fast food industry. Because it's a hard job.
If I were a supervillain, I would end capitalism, racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia... but I guess that's a little too obvious and not villain-y enough. Because that's actually being a superhero. I would break down poverty with my machete; I would end world hunger.
I think my biggest fear is dying. Although sometimes my biggest fear is not dying. But yeah, I think health stuff for me is more what I'm afraid of.
I think the [fan] access is complicated, because it brings wonderful things into my life, and it brings really negative things into my life. I just try to keep the negative stuff at arm's length. Laugh at it and walk away.
The cool thing about the Internet is that it's allowing women more access to their own history.
I think that feminism is in cycle. Feminism rotates between backlash and interest.
What I've heard from younger women and women my age is that the albums changed their lives or it was the first time they had heard feminism that they could relate to. So that's great.
I'm a very binary person in a bad way where it's like everything is either totally great or totally awful.
Taking care of yourself is the most important thing.
Find something that makes you happy, like looking at beautiful pictures, or, if you're able, listening to beautiful music, or sitting by the window and looking outside - small things like that can be absolutely huge.
Don't get down on yourself that you can't run a 4K or dance all night long at a fun club. Give yourself a break.
I'm so language-based and I'm so about communicating, and my art has always been very audience-based, and very about being functional and communicating something, and about feeling like I have to be heard.
My original goal in the '90s, after I found feminism and I was the first generation in my family to go to college, was to spread this information that feminism was still very much alive, and that you can't believe the media telling you that it doesn't need to exist and that it doesn't exist.
I was never trying to be the voice for anybody else. I was just trying to sing about what I was going through, and was singing about those things specifically because I knew there was an audience not being served.