Confessions of a Former Little Monster

In 2008, a singer-songwriter going by the name Lady GaGa exploded onto the pop music scene. I was seventeen at the time, a junior in high school. I remember getting ready for a bath and listening to "Again Again" and thinking "Wow, this girl has something special." In the middle of a pop album, there was an acoustic piece, sung with raw emotion with little more than a piano for accompaniment. Then, of course, there were all the other songs on the album that didn't reply on being completely overproduced and auto-tuned to death. You could imagine every song being played on a guitar or piano and sounding just as cool. 

The Fame Monster came out the next November, during my first semester of college. I remember watching the music video for "Bad Romance" and being completely blown away. That was the last time I had such a positive reaction to one of her music videos.

When GaGa dropped "Born This Way" as her first single off the eponymous album in 2011, I was floored. Upon my first listening, It sounded like everything she wasn't: simple (basically a three-chord song), cliche, and, worst of all, overproduced to death. Yet I came to realize that it was in fact very much GaGa in a way: the lyrics spoke of genuine issues and self-empowerment through vapid platitudes, there was a bridge in which she basically speaks her rhymes to the listener (as heard in "Poker Face," and then later on her album with "Judas" and "Schiße," just to name a few), and her vocals seemed to impart how much she truly believes in the empowering nature of her piece. 

I saw her in concert the day before Easter, just days after "Judas" was released as Born This Way's second single. She performed "Born This Way" from her piano, with no other accompaniment, and I nearly cried; I could feel how she was hoping to inspire every person in the audience. the very best part of the concert was when she performed "You and I," which had not yet been released, from her piano; I fell in love with that song, most likely because it was so unlike "Born This Way" in that it was sung with such passion and not comprised of layers of electronic muck. 

When Born This Way was released, I found it to be GaGa's best effort to date. There were German metal and European electronica vibes to it that seemed to mesh perfectly with the pop mentality of GaGa, signaling the evolution of her music itself. in a way, "Born This Way" did not fit the album for me at all; it still seems like a very weak effort (in fact, GaGa apparently wrote the music for the song in a five minute period, so there's that). The song also made use of two racist terms in the line "No matter black white or beige/ chola or orient made" and used the phrase "transgendered life" (the word is transgender!).

The fanfare leading up to the release of GaGa's album was also very strange. Who can forget when she went to the VMAs in a giant egg (which she says she stayed in for three days, for some reason) to represent her "rebirth"? I recall an interview in which she struggled to explain how the album was "Born This Way" when she said that "you can be reborn multiple times over." She didn't seem to even know what she was trying to say because of the contradictions in her message. Should I be proud of being "born this way" or should I be "reborn," i.e. change? The egg doesn't seem to make much sense in this respect; the message should have been about evolution, not rebirth.

The very concept of "Born This Way" is supposed to reassure gay youth that they should be proud of who they were born as, which I profoundly disagree with. Don't be proud what you are born as, be proud of who you live as. Be proud of your LGBTQ selfhood, because it is an inseparable part of your identity, an identity you love and continue to build every day. Being born gay, bi, or trans* is not necessarily the same as living it, and it takes much more strength to do the latter each and every day.

I was working at a department store when Born This Way came out, and I was friends with a coworker named Joe. Joe was an out-and-proud gay man, and a Catholic. One of the first things he said to me was "I'm proud to be gay, I was born this way!" We would typically talk about gay rights, an especially salient topic for the summer of 2011, when gay marriage was legalized in New York. I don't remember how the issue came up, but I mentioned something about trans* rights. Joe turned to me with a look of revulsion and said, "No, that's disgusting."

I was taken aback, and it took several seconds for me to first digest what he had just said, and then to respond. There was a real sense of hatred behind his words, and it confused me. "But you're gay!" I said. "You know what it is like to not be accepted for who you are."

"Taylor, I was born gay," he replied. "God made me a man. If God makes you a man, you can't just be a woman. It's wrong."

And right there is the problem with Born This Way for me: it assumes that identity is fixed from birth, and that acceptance should be based solely on circumstances beyond our control. This concept was used by a gay man to denounce trans* individuals and support his own hatred for them. It speaks to the broader issue of mainstream LGBTQ culture's ostracization of trans* and nonbinary people. In this, at least, Lady GaGa does represent mainstream gay culture very well: selectively accepting.

A few days ago, Lady GaGa released the first single off her new album, "Applause." And it is absolutely terrible. It sounds like ... nothing. Just another pop song with little or no meaning. I had hoped that GaGa would follow the route she seemed to be taking with the better songs off Born This Way ("Government Hooker," "Heavy Metal Lover," "You and I"). But she is going down the route of the eponymous single of that album; the route of bland, self-aggrandizing mediocrity.

Despite my love for Lady GaGa's music and (in part) for her, I have a lot of trouble with the problematic things she says and does. To begin with, I find that she is trying to appoint herself as not just a gay icon, but as a literal savior. Look no further than her self-assigned moniker: "Mother Monster." Her whole shtick is teaching her little monsters about being who they want to be. Not only that, but she seems like a manufactured gay icon; that is to say, her status as such appears to have been pushed by GaGa herself. More than that, however, is the fact that as "Mother Monster," she appears to be a shepherd giving a voice to LGBTQ youth. In essence, then, she is rendering these individuals somehow as victims; by shouting for them, she often speaks over them. Her transmisogynistic comments and views are further put into perspective when you remember that the Human Rights Campaign was petitioning people to support gay marriage outside of her concert in 2011 - the same human Rights Campaign that has a history of cissexism and transphobia.

Much has been made of GaGa's sexuality, but the most we have to go on is that she might be bisexual. The problem, however, is that what she has ended up representing at large is an Ally with a savior complex, not as a member of the community. 

She truly does represent the mainstream gay culture, not the full LGBTQ spectrum. Otherwise how can we explain her blasé use of the word "tr***y"? Or how she addressed rumors that she herself was trans* by saying her vagina was offended? Or how the music video for "Telephone" again had her equating genitals with gender identity? Then we come to her "alter ego" Joe Calderone." The whole concept of dressing as a trans* person is frankly insulting, especially since she is merely using a marginalized identity to appear "edgy." The move will be applauded as daring while actual trans* individuals will be verbally and physically assaulted for doing it. Dressing as trans* and including trans* people and drag queens in her videos and performances eroticizes real life trans* people without doing anything to support them.

Tumblr user said it best:

Furthermore, “born this way” rhetoric is pretty exclusive of a lot of people. Yeah, I was born this way, but this way happens to be wrong. I have body parts that are absolutely incorrect, but apparently I should love that? And including genderstuff in “born this way” assumes that gender is static, which is excluding people who are gender-fluid and gender-complicated and people who have multiple genders.

She's also used the term "the gays" which I view as objectifying (it is used in the media and genuine news outlets, of course, but I cringe hearing it. I'm sure I am not the only person who feels this way) and, especially in her case, an umbrella term for LGBTQ people. It's more evidence that she equates "LGBTQ" with simply "gay."

And aside from her relationship with the LGBTQ community, she has participated in outright racism.

• She had a photoshoot where she appeared with fans wearing blackface, 
• wore brownface herself, 
• donned a sari (which she apparently "fixed" by tearing it up in some sort of homage to New York), 
• and most recently, sexualized a burqa and niqab (the latter of which she accessorized with a handbag with the word "CUNT" on it). 

In fact, she insulted the Muslim community further with an entire song called "Burqa," which was leaked a few days ago. The lyrics themselves sexualize it when in fact a burqa is worn by many Islamic women because they strive to be respected for their mind, not their bodies. The song asserts that the burqa is a covering to hide her, not at all what it truly represents. In effect, sexualizing the burqa does the exact opposite of what it is supposed to do for women. It is ignorant fetishization of a culture she knows nothing about.

Then there is the fact that she uses the word "ret****d" and denies being a feminist thusly: "I'm not a feminist - I, I hail men, I love men. I celebrate American male culture, and beer, and bars and muscle cars..." She basically equates feminism with man-hating. Which is is 100 percent not, of course. (She later redacted this statement and claimed she was a feminist, but...)

Most of all, as much as Lady GaGa thrives on being different and unique, there is very little she has incorporated into her performances, style, and songs that is not copied, sometimes wholesale, from others.

• Most obviously, "Born This Way" sounds almost identical to Madonna's song "Express Yourself." 
• GaGa poked at Christianity with her song "Judas" and with her video for "Alejandro" while Madonna did the same things two decades earlier. 
• Lady GaGa's glam persona is obviously influenced partly by David Bowie. I mean look.
• Joe Calderone vs Annie Lennox: 1 2
• More copying of Madonna 1 2 3 4 5 6
• Copying Britney Spears 1 2
•  Copying Kylie Minogue 1 2 3

It is very difficult for me to continue loving Lady GaGa, the musician who sang with such passion when I first heard her in 2008 and released such fantastic music leading up to Born This Way, when I know all of the problematic things she has said and done. I still like her and will continue to listen to her music, but I am not the Little Monster I proudly was when I attended her Fame Monster Tour in 2011. I am a Little Monster no more.

Andrea Peyser: An Insult To Her Profession And To Common Decency

I read this article in yesterday’s NY Post, and I can’t seem to suppress my anger.

Andrea Peyser, a woman who masquerades as a journalist and can barely write above high school level, is angry. Angry because someone made a movie out of a book about 9/11: Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. Several movies have focused on the events of the day—-World Trade Center and United 93 being the most prominent ones—- but this is the one that put her over the edge, it seems.

After seeing the promos for the film, I knew at once that I could never see this movie. It’s the typical Oscar-baiting melodrama, something I do not really care for in most instances. I also tend to think it is a bit too early to have movies about September 11th. For New Yorkers especially, 9/11 is still a very recent. However, a decade may not be too short a time period for others. It may very well be a good movie, but I know that I myself cannot come to appreciate it. Yet I understand that this is a personal thing (9/11 is very personal for so many, after all), and my opinion about a film I have not seen is not the final word on the subject.

But Peyser doesn’t see it like that. Calling the handful of pictures dealing with September 11th a new movie genre called “9/11 porn,” she establishes the fact that she has no idea what "porn" really is. She proclaims that Osama bin Laden would have “loved this.” Loved what? A piece of media dealing with a devastating attack on the country? Does anything about 9/11 that doesn’t scream about American patriotism automatically earn it praise from Muslim extremists?

She doesn’t stop there. She assumes that the grieving souls who suffered on 9/11 would not go to see the film, as if she speaks for every victim of the attacks, and declares that the movie “tells lies.”

Right off the bat she calls the main character of the film, a nine year old boy, "weird." She then mentions that the boy is autistic (likely Asperger’s). Just to clarify: we have a woman who is offended by a film about 9/11 already making fun of an autistic child. For someone who is decrying a movie for being unsympathetic, this is a hypocritical move. She goes on to call the child an “entitled, self-absorbed, and self-mutilating boy.” Does she even understand autism? And of course he feels entitled and self-absorbed: every child at age nine feels that way.

She takes umbrage with the fact that nobody ever says outright that the boy’s father, played by Tom Hanks, was “murdered.” She says that the events of 9/11 are presented as “some kind of cosmic accident.”

She says that this is a movie that “does for the monsters who brought down the World Trade Center what ‘Triumph of the Will’ did for a guy named Adolph.” What? I was under the impression that the movie was not about the actual attacks, but about how a boy deals with his father’s death. And has she even seen Triumph of the Will? It is a Nazi propaganda film. Peyser seems put off by the fact that this isn’t a propaganda film for American patriotism. In one breath she decries the film for being like a propaganda film like Triumph of the Will, and in the next breath condemns it for refusing to add in the tropes of such a propaganda film.

Unless the movie spent time idolizing the extremists who brought down the plane, I have the feeling that Peyser not only has never seen Triumph of the Will, but has no clue what the movie was about in the first place.

She goes on to further demonize a nine year old autistic child:

The horrid boy curses out his doorman…and cruelly abuses his mom… Appearing in every last frame of the film, the kid becomes the movie’s only identifiable terrorist. He tells his defeated mom, “I wish it were you in the building instead of him.”

“So do I,” she replies.

Nothing is spared in this quest for emotional blackmail, cheap thrills, and a naked ploy for an Oscar.

Once again: a nine year old autistic child. Of course he is self-absorbed. That’s the nature of Asperger’s: the person with it focuses on very specific things, and cannot stop talking or thinking about these very specific things. In an adult, being an entitled jerk is one thing. But mix being a nine year old child with autism and you don’t have a “terrorist” (a despicable thing to call anyone dealing with the loss of a loved one, much less a child), but a suffering youth who is likely to hurl abusive things at loved ones. Everything Peyser is saying is not only heartless and cruel, but downright evil and ignorant.

I return to Peyser’s outrage that the film is about a child and his own journey, and not specifically focused on demonizing the people who caused 9/11:

The most outrageous falsehood promoted in the film is the thing it leaves out. The word “terrorist” is consciously never said. Nor is “murderers,” “butchers,” or “Muslim extremists.”

This is not done because the movie is not about the people who caused the attacks. It isn’t trying to emulate propaganda, or trying to place blame anywhere. It’s about a boy.

In a climactic scene, Bullock tells her son that 9/11 “made no sense.” This is the biggest lie of all.

For 9/11 made perfect sense. It was an act of barbarity committed by people bent on destroying this city and this nation.

I remember the aftermath of the attacks. I remember people clearly saying that 9/11 made no sense to them. Namely, the people affected by the tragedy. Ten years later it is easier to have a sense of perspective. But the film takes place two years after the attacks, and it is a subjective look at two people who suffered a great loss directly caused by the attacks. The fact that it made no sense to these characters isn’t meant as a statement that represents the reality of the day for everyone (something Peyser does herself in the article, revealing yet another hypocritical side of this despicable woman).

She claims that “families of 9/11 victims have uniformly rejected the film without seeing it.” Right here, we have a woman speaking on behalf of everyone who suffered from the 9/11 attacks. As a journalist, she should know that this is unacceptable for someone in her position to do.

Peyser only speaks for herself, although she would like to think that she represents New York, as well as those who suffered great losses. She thinks that as a New Yorker, she deserves to speak on behalf of the 9/11 victims. But I am a New Yorker too. I am a New Yorker who remembers September 11th very clearly. I am a New Yorker who is not afraid to say: Andrea Peyser, you do not speak for me, and you do not speak for the people of New York. You are not only a failure as a journalist, you are a failure as a human being. You complain about the fact that the boy in this movie is unsympathetic? Remember this: he is only a character. You, however, are real, and you are the only unsympathetic monster in the equation.

Why Leonard Peikoff, and the Top 1 Percent, Are Way Off Base

I've recently gone back to Ayn Rand, whose work and philosophy has been instrumental in my upbringing; my mother's parents, after all, were die-hard Objectivists who attended many of Ayn Rand's lectures during the 1970s. Even before I read any of Rand's work in high school, I was raised with the basic tenants of her philosophy: believe in the individual spirit, and work toward making yourself a better person: this was the main thing I remember. That still rings true today, and I believe it is one of the most important and truthful aspect of the philosophy. As for the rest however.... well, we'll see about that.

I read Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead in my senior year of high school. At the time they were life-changing, inspirational, and amazing. I did disagree with several points of Rand's philosophy, but they were minor. I am now three years older, and three years wiser. I am, therefore, going to do what many may consider unthinkable: I am going to reread Atlas Shrugged, and note which ideas I now disagree with, seeing as how I have evolved over the course of three years from a slightly to the right moderate to a liberal.

First though, I want to address an essay written by the heir to Ayn Rand's estate, and her handpicked heir to the head of the Objectivist movement, Leonard Peikoff. The title essay of the book Why Businessmen Need Philosophy, first published in 1999, is as indicative today as it was over twelve years ago of the state of denial businessmen are in.