Independent Women, Part III

I was 11 years old when the soundtrack from the 2000 film Charlie’s Angels was released. Independent Women by Destiny’s Child was arguably the film’s only saving grace, pleasing critics and audiences where Charlie’s Angels could not; it paid tribute to women making it on their own and called for their independence from men, portraying the female gender as strong, determined and just as capable of making it in a man’s world as Man himself. For an 11-year-old girl, this was a wonderful message. For a girl not even halfway through her education, with aspirations of someday being a famous author, and discouraged from the institution of marriage by the poisonous relationships between men and women that existed around her, this song was inspiring, uplifting... and really quite catchy.

As a 24-year-old woman, I am no longer all that inspired by the song’s message. My formal education is complete, I am not yet a famous author and I could happily live with or without marriage. The line “All the honeys who makin’ money throw your hands up at me” doesn’t fill me with quite the same sense of empowerment that it used to. I don’t make a lot of money (a lot of the time I don’t make any money), and while I may not be dependent on any man to provide for me, I can hardly claim that “The house I live in (I bought it), the car I’m driving (I bought it)”, because I am simply not in the financial position to buy a house or a car, and I am certainly not in the position to say “The rocks I’m rockin’ (I bought it)”. Kudos to those women who are able to say such things, and I do not doubt their fantastic work ethic and refusal to give up or give in, but I still consider them to be part of a lucky minority, and suggesting that a woman is empowered only if she is financially stable on her own is isolating and damaging to women not privileged or fortunate enough to be able to say the same of themselves.

This culture of associating female empowerment with financial or material worth has only accelerated over the last 13 years, and is reflected heavily in the music industry today. Nicki Minaj, whose fanbase consists largely of teenage girls and young women, infuriatingly assigns her own worth to the money lining her pocket. On Check It Out, her collaboration with will.i.am, she boasts, “Mad cause I’m getting money in abundance, man I can’t even count all of these hundreds. Duffle bag every time I go to SunTrust, I leave the rest just to collect interest”, while on Muny (Material Girls), a kind of tribute to Madonna’s 1984 hit Material Girl, she says, “Top five tax bracket in the population, hatin’ and I know they got a reason why, I ain’t got to wonder if I want to lease or buy.”

Of course, a love of money and materialism in the music industry is not reserved exclusively for women, and this is something that plagues male artists’ music as well, consequently influencing the young listeners who buy and download their records. Often these male artists (though I’m sure sometimes with the best of intentions) reinforce these attitudes, commending the “independent women” whose independence is quantified by the money she earns: women who are presented as sexy, beautiful and desirable only if they “bought it”. Perhaps this interest in money comes from the relative poverty these musicians came from, and bragging about climbing out of the depths of deprivation inspires those still living in the midst of it to work harder and try harder, as the capitalist ethos would urge you to do. However, it is simply impossible for every person in the world to achieve the same levels of success as the members of Destiny’s Child, Nicki Minaj and Madonna, as well as anyone else who brags along to a nice little tune about how big their swimming pool is.

I find it sad that we have been taught that validation comes from earning a six-figure salary, and it is detrimental to the aims of an all-inclusive feminism to preach to young women – especially in a society already heavily saturated with a kind of submissive sexuality that caters to patriarchal fantasies – that the only way to be truly successful or happy or have any worth as a woman is to have money. Yes, with money comes power, and as long as that money rests in the bank accounts of mostly white men from privileged backgrounds, women and other oppressed groups should certainly be pressing for and celebrating an equal spread of the world’s economic wealth. However, to suggest that this is the only way to be a strong and empowered woman is a damaging argument to make to those who will probably never be “independent” by these standards.

Can we please have less focus on the money, and less judgement passed upon the majority who don’t drive a Benz or have every finger wrapped in diamonds. Can we please instead have more focus on a strong and united sisterhood.