Women Buskers and Sexual Safety

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: alanabit
Date: 13 Aug 05 - 04:52 AM

I can only agree with Little Hawk. I have seen many women do shows on the street, which were very successful and made fun of men a lot. Off the top of my head, I can think of Shirley Sunflower, Kate the Great and Enigmatic Eve. I don't really think the gender content was an issue. What these performers had, was the charm and wit to get the audience on their side whatever they were talking about.
I don't think I have seen your show Kirsten, because I work in Europe and I am assuming that you work mainly in the US. You could well have had problems working here, but they would more likely have been to do with the situations that all buskers face rather than the content of your show. The police really have better things to do than to harass buskers.
I did read your article, as it happened. It is simply that my own experiences of busking (which admittedly go no further back than 1978)have not yet brought me into contact with the sort of problems which you are talking about. I would agree there are always issues of safety, but unless we agree on how "sexual safety" differs from that, I would say this is a new one for me.
It is a shame I can't PM you, because I would quite happily discuss busking with you. What you obviously believe so firmly is equally obviously rooted in your experience. We have not all had the same experiences - and that is not only because I am a man.

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: Little Hawk
Date: 13 Aug 05 - 03:28 AM

People who seek confrontation find it. If they are willing to pay the price for that, fine with me. ;-) If they're not willing to, then they have a problem...

Why don't you put some energy into the good things you are FOR, rather than the bad things you are against? It's more effective. Actions fueled by anger beget more anger. Actions fueled by love beget more love. Celebrate what's good in life, Kirsten, because that is where your real power lies.

******

Kirsten, are you aware that ANY anonymous Guest can go onto this forum and pretend to BE you simply by typing "kirsten" in the little "from" box when they post?

And then they can say something that makes you look exactly the way they want you to look?

I would strongly advise that you LOG IN under your membername before you post here.

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: GUEST,buster busker
Date: 12 Aug 05 - 11:59 PM

I understand the problems you're posing. I've not heard of, or known of any other women buskers who have suffered safety issues in their lives while performing in this way. I have seen other women buskers who have used their sexual energy in a very teasing manner. They've dressed and/or posed provocatively while performing. I've even busked in combos with these women and surprisingly have not found this to be an altogether dangerous activity on their part. They had no ill encounters, that I was aware of, with members of the opposite gender, nor any with those of the same gender. They were not, however, trying to stretch the bounds of acceptable language and/or subject matter as you have been with your act.

I'll have to agree with a few other previous posters that now seems to be "the" era of male bashing. There are, after all, a great many men out there that deserve such treatment. I guess that's why the habit of poking fun at male attitudes has become so prominent among so many writers. Take a look at most sitcoms and the buffoon/idiot/boob/dunce/dope who hasn't got a clue is predominantly a role filled by a male character. However, this is no recent development. The prevalence of male clowning is a tradition that dates back many years. We have had a great many such characters to laugh at for generations. The list is simply too long, but I'm certain we can all name our favorites. Such dominance in a field as this is certainly slow to change.

There have been others who have ventured down the same path as you and found it equally challenging. Being a pioneer is never an easy road Kirst. Hang in there kid. Things are gonna get easier.

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: *daylia*
Date: 12 Aug 05 - 11:19 PM

So - you use the image of a nun for protection as you engage in public behavior no nun would endorse (ie "as open in their sexuality as men are on the street").

Hmmmm, well I'm glad you find the protection you need, Kirsten.

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: GUEST,kirsten
Date: 12 Aug 05 - 10:57 PM

First of all, maybe you need some background on why I dress like a nun. I was ticketed and threatened with arrest 8 times in Santa Cruz for obscenity and peace disturbance for my busking. It was ridiculous. And for stupid crap. Like I do a song about the message from the media and how it affects women...it says "girls have got to act a certain way or else they ain't a-ok, always be willing, never get mad, or they call us bitch, they tell us we're bad" and later int hat song it says "girls don't fart, they only fluff" and I got tickets for fart and bitch! I won with the aclu, but it was nuts. So as this was going on, I started pitting the cop costume that cops on the street wear against a nun outfit, and I was pleased to see the public was not willing to go against a nun for a cop so once I wore the habit, I was pretty protected!

I am in a long line of political humor based on upbringing. I went to the same catholic high school as cheech of cheech and chong. Cheech has made fun of our shared upbrining to the tune of millions. You have probably listened to him yourself...You have all seen Father Sarducci on SNL, this idea of imitating someone from your religion as a joke is not new, it is only when women do it that it is a scandalous scene, apparently. No one is complaining about mocking priests, like sarducci! No one complains about Tom Lehrer's Vatican Rag?! Yes, women can make fun of religion, just like men!

And no, this article would not even be the same AT ALL if it just said safety, not sexual safety. Did you read it? Did you not see how women are most safe when they sing about heterosexual songs lamenting males leaving them crying? I said women who are as open in their sexuality as men are on the street go through DIFFERENT things in a double standard of sexuality, that is what the article SAYS...so yes, sexual safety IS in there and it is about the gender double standard, men can be singing about balling all night, I say fart and I am ticketed!

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: GUEST
Date: 12 Aug 05 - 05:30 PM

What bullshit to excuse the desexualization of men.

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: GUEST,daylia
Date: 12 Aug 05 - 03:35 PM

I've never yet needed - or wanted - to busk for a living. In all honesty, I'd have to be pretty desperate to willingly place myself in such a risky situation. So kudos to you, Kirsten!

I just find it so interesting - and disappointing - that even the people who fight the hardest, longest and loudest
for "equality", "freedom" and "respect" for women still think it's just fine to condemn or ridicule a woman's clothing, spiritual beliefs or sexual choices ... as long as she's a nun, that is!

Nuns are probably the most misunderstood women on earth. So thank you, LH and Peace, for setting the record a bit straighter here.

I think the ever-increasingly-popular sport of nun-bashing is probably due to a sort of "pendulum effect" though - the backlash created by a couple millenia of male domination and the corresponding "desexualization" and subjugation of women that nuns, unfortunately, still represent. INstead of deifying nuns as the "ultimate in femininity" as in by-gone days, in this more enlightened era we've swung to the other extreme. If that's the case, I might just see the end of it before my days are over - I hope!

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: alanabit
Date: 12 Aug 05 - 02:46 PM

I am a bit baffled by the phrase "sexual safety". Not trying to be provocative there Kirsten, but I think simply saying "safety" would have been enough.
Busking is potentially dangerous anyway. If you intend to do it well, the first thing you have to do in a show is to gain attention. It does not always come in the forms which you wish it to. Your show can attract the attention of your audience, but it can also attract the bossy shop owner, an aggressive drunk or just your common or garden bully, who likes to feel superior to someone else.
As travelling and being in strange places is an integral part of the job, yes it can be dangerous. For instance, I could imagine that a woman needs to me more careful than a man about accepting invitations or selecting a place to sleep in general.
I was fairly strict about several things when I was doing it full time (up to a couple of years ago). For instance, I would not drink alcohol if I was going to sleep alone in my bus at night. (I never drink when working). It was different when I was parked next to other buskers. (Assaulting one busker among his or her friends is an effective way to commit suicide). I disposed of money quickly and I was very careful about getting my instruments and equipment to a safe, secure place after a show before partying - if I was going to party. It was also important to be strict about eating properly. Especially in summer, you can dehydrate quickly if you don't - no matter how much you drink.
Safety is important if you want to stay in the game for any length of time. I can appreciate that there are some differences for female buskers. Let's face it though, there are some differences in the needs of men and women in plenty of other professions too. In that respect, I don't think that busking is so different. I am interested in your comments though, Kirsten and in seeing how the discussion develops.

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: Little Hawk
Date: 12 Aug 05 - 10:20 AM

By wearing unattractive enough clothing and adopting an unpleasant enough manner, almost anyone, male OR female can repell virtually all potential sexual harassment, right, Garg? I think you're onto a good thing. You ought to write a book or something. ;-)

And, yes, it IS acceptable to ridicule men nowadays. In fact, it's encouraged. I wonder why? I guess "everyone needs someone that they can look down on", right? (Until they grow up....)

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 12 Aug 05 - 02:04 AM

If you are outside the EU, ie US/CA ...walk 6 to 60 miles...for a job center.

Sincerely,
Gargoyle

What sort of derrilect poverity and insult has reduced to this plight......was your last quid dropped in a Victoria Station E-Cafe to allow you this final thread to HOPE??

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 12 Aug 05 - 01:58 AM

If they are "obtrusive" wrap your boobies with stretch-athletic-binding.

Dress as a man, speak as a man, walk as a man, even STINCK like a man (it may require rolling in subway urine.)

Recognize your "calling" as an honorable profession...and if urine....is necessary....then let it be.

If assaulted be ready to VOMIT all over the assailant. I good craw full of cheap Dago-Vino should always be on the ready...for a reply.

After 72 hours....if you feel like a half-used, unappriciated, French whore.....walk six blocks and check into the most appealing job-training-program in the vicinity.

Sincerely,
Gargoyle

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: GUEST
Date: 12 Aug 05 - 01:47 AM

Seems the only women it's still 'acceptable' (?) to ridicule these days are nuns.

That has been replaced by men. It is acceptable to ridicule men.

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: Cluin
Date: 12 Aug 05 - 12:26 AM

But not the inspiration for "The Penguin" in the movie "The Blues Brothers".

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: Peace
Date: 11 Aug 05 - 10:14 PM

Mother Teresa was the ultimate busker.

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: Little Hawk
Date: 11 Aug 05 - 10:12 PM

Well, some of them are mad, I suppose... ;-) On the other hand, some of them (a few, at least) are inspired. I know of some such. They don't talk about God so much as they DO godly things. Mother Teresa was a spectacular example of that, and she helped many people.

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: GUEST
Date: 11 Aug 05 - 10:04 PM

Yep I agree Little Hawk. Thats why I was making the nun jokes earlier.

Some things are just undeniably funny. Like women dressed as polar birds and banging on about God. They're freaking mad.

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: Little Hawk
Date: 11 Aug 05 - 09:54 PM

Ah. Well, it works like this, Kirsten. It's a joke. Once you are here awhile, you will get much better at figuring out when various of us are serious, and when we're not. I am quite willing to discuss things seriously, and often do, but I also joke around a lot, as you will discover.

My earlier post on this thread was dead serious. My later remark about the penguins was a joke. I find that when serious discussions grow heated (as sometimes happens, not that it did so much with this one) that it helps to leaven the discussion now and then with a bit of unexpected humour...

This is particularly true in political discussions. It's amazing how bent out of shape some people get when they disagree with another on some point, even a minor one. They begin to hate the other person and attack everything they say, no matter what it is. This kind of hatred can easily be defused with a little humour. When they realize you are keeping your sense of humour, they begin to regain their own. It mends fences.

That doesn't have much to do with this particular thread, but it is the main reason why I have learned to joke a lot on Mudcat. It's become a sort of habit. If I show that I am not taking myself or the whole thing all that seriously, then it becomes easier for the other person to relate to me...with the exception of people who are simply addicted to anger. They are very hard to reach, because they'd rather be angry than happy. They're rather be "right" than be happy. They'd rather be miserable than be happy. It's an emotional disease.

And THAT is why we must free the pengins!!! (that's a joke)

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: Cluin
Date: 11 Aug 05 - 09:47 PM

Don't worry about it, Kirsten. It's another one of Little Hawk's inside jokes that he takes out for a walk and lets poop on everybody's lawn.

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: GUEST
Date: 11 Aug 05 - 09:46 PM

Oh yes and I forgot to mention, Nun For A Pound. As you may have heard about Hull, we've got very cheap habits.

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: GUEST
Date: 11 Aug 05 - 09:45 PM

Penguin buskers would be very welcome in Hull. We're very fishy here.

As for nuns, we've an excellent shop for them - What Every Nun Wants.

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: GUEST,kirsten
Date: 11 Aug 05 - 09:38 PM

I don't get the whole penguin reference thing...???

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: GUEST,daylia
Date: 11 Aug 05 - 04:45 PM

Seems the only women it's still 'acceptable' (?) to ridicule these days are nuns.

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: Little Hawk
Date: 11 Aug 05 - 02:07 PM

However, penguins face problems in busking that women can only guess at. Give this some thought, and count your blessings, Kisten. ;-)

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: Little Hawk
Date: 11 Aug 05 - 01:55 PM

For sure, John. Busking is a tough game, and it's got to be even tougher for a woman. The attitudes of the social authorities are not generally very helpful to buskers.

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 11 Aug 05 - 01:41 PM

LH -

Agreed 100% with what you say, but the point was that a good, and versatile, female singer in a busking situation is not necessarily permitted to follow the same rules as a male singer in the same situation. I don't see any conflict in agreeing with that point as fully as with yours.

In my case, it's academic. My town licenses massage therapists and escort services, but absolutely prohibits busking. A proposal to legalize "street musicians" has been recently sent to the city and county officials, but probably will result in another "$60,000 study" with no useful result - the standard response here to any suggestion from the public.

John

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: Little Hawk
Date: 11 Aug 05 - 01:11 PM

I'm a man, and I'm bored as hell with women who sing nothing but "male-centred songs", as you put it. The female performers I was deeply influenced by when I was young were Joan Baez and Buffy Sainte-Marie. They sang about everything, including every sort of social and political issue. More power to them! They were the first 2 performers I really listened to. Then came Bob Dylan...so my holy trinity of music is 2/3 female, even though I'm a male.

Lousy male songwriters, as you say, tend to write about sex, getting drunk, getting high, and about what a big dick they have (figuratively speaking, if not literally). Lousy female songwriters tend to write a lot of sad, drippy love songs.

In both cases...gimme a break! (but the males are even harder to take than the females)

Great songwriters write about everything. Everything in Life. Same as great novelists. They address the deeper issues, and they also write about the fun stuff. Great songwriters do not regard the male (or female) genitalia as "sacred", but merely necessary for an effective sex life and procreation...neither do they denigrate the male or female genitalia out of some sense of hostility.

The "ideal woman" you describe is a totally ridiculous notion, as you clearly agree. In reacting against that notion, please do NOT go and make sweeping generalizations about us men. Some of us are not idiots.

A "war between the sexes" is not a war worth fighting, in my opinion, and will not be supported by those who see other people as people first, and see their gender identity long after that.

Besides, I've lived lives as a man AND lives as a woman numerous times before this present embodiment, so why the hell would I get hung up on being just exclusively one or the other at this point????

EQUALITY, sister! And mutual love and respect. That is what puts us on a good basis.

I have plenty of compassion for any female who busks on a regular basis. Given the levels of ignorance out there, she is bound to have to put up with a lot of unpleasant stuff. As for the police, they intimidate males too. Some people don a uniform just so they can go on a power trip, it seems.

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: open mike
Date: 11 Aug 05 - 12:47 PM

well done, sister. A good reply to thos who might say
"We'll have nun of that"
I recall i dressed as a nun for halloween the year I
was very pregnant in october with a child who was
born in november.

Subject: RE: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: Amos
Date: 11 Aug 05 - 10:29 AM

Give 'em hell, Kirsten!


A

Subject: Women Buskers and Sexual Safety
From: kirstenanderberg
Date: 11 Aug 05 - 01:34 AM

WOMEN STREET PERFORMERS AND SEXUAL SAFETY
By Kirsten Anderberg (www.kirstenanderberg.com)

Everyone agrees street performing, or "busking," is hard work. Someone once said about acting, that they do not pay you for the acting, they pay you for the waiting around. That is true in busking, too. Performing talent is about 30% of a good street act. The ability to persevere under harsh conditions, to battle police and merchants over air space, to assert free speech rights at every corner as they are questioned, to spontaneously gather and hold a crowd, and to keep up with hecklers, makes the profession a die-hard one, at best. You spend little time on musical rehearsal, as compared to holding your place in line for a good spot, or "pitch," and then defending that pitch from police when they show up to shut you down. Street performing is not for the weak. And being a solo woman street performer has extra unseen entanglements, due to societal gender stereotypes.

American society traditionally wanted women to be seen, and not heard. The "Ideal Woman" was dependant upon men "for her keep," like a slave, serving males like royalty. She had a natural nurturing instinct that made her clean and cook as if it was innate, and she enjoyed childcare as her primary goal in life. Women were not to be sexual in any realm, except for procreation, and as her husband's sexual property, as defined in our rape laws. Women did not need to vote, read, attend college, or be involved with property, politics, or money, was the idea. Solo woman street performers directly conflict with these "ideals." They make their own money, they are loud and independent, they speak their mind, they talk about politics, they compete with the boys, sometimes stealing the spotlight with women's issues, and they encourage other women to do the same, as visible role models in the public square.

If you are a woman breaking gender roles by commanding street corners for entertainment, your safest bet is to sing sad love songs, depicting yourself as lovelorn and lost, still looking for a man to save you. Or as Joni Mitchell sings, "There's a wide, wide world of noble causes…but all I really want to do right now is find another lover." Although people are uncomfortable with your use of the street venue, as a woman, they are consoled by the material, which fits the female stereotypes and keeps a male focus. When I began street performing at age 18 in 1978, I followed these gender rules. I had a confident stage presence and strong voice, yet I sang about needing a man, and of men who left me heartbroken. One day a male street performer came up to me and said, "Is love all you can sing about?" It made me take notice of what men sang about. They sang about sex, and getting drunk and high. They were singing about traveling, and wars, and whaling, and politics. And about trying to stay away from women who would marry them. They were not singing forlorn love songs.

Holly Near had released a song called "Get Off Me Baby" around this time. She said she liked singing blues, but hated blues because the lyrics usually victimized the women. So she wrote the song where the woman is empowered, and the difference was marked. Immediately I saw the power in taking traditional forms of music, and twisting them to empower, rather than victimize, the women. Often, sadly, it was as easy as switching the genders in songs, to make the woman end up the victor. By pushing these boundaries, I found out that sexist double-standards exist, double-standards that you may never see if you were not actually a solo woman street performer yourself. I began to sing "Summertime," as "Your mama's rich, and your daddy's good looking," as one of my first gender lyric switches. I began to focus on issues that were relevant to me, as a woman and mother. While the men were singing about balling all night, I was singing about men's responsibilities in birth control and child support, and was developing lesbian comedy. Many people felt I should be jailed for such behavior in public.

I have asked many street performers, male and female, why they think there are so few solo women street performers. Predominantly, women buskers show up with a male street performer they date, play with them until they break up, and that is the end of their busking career. A very small handful of women can, and continue to, perform as professional solo women street performers in America. The ratio of male to female solo career buskers is about 90:10. The most common reason buskers gave me for why they think women do not busk solo is a fear of rape, basically. They are afraid it would be construed as "asking for it" if they sang on a street and then were raped later. They fear they will be mistaken for prostitutes, the way male performers can be mistaken for "bums." Yet I found I was safer than most women I know in downtown areas I busked in, because I knew the street people, and they treated me as an asset to their world. Street people protected me from harmful people, intervening, explaining I give good free music, so to leave me alone. But the main reason women tend to avoid performing on the streets alone is this sexual safety issue.

If women are scared doing male-centered, meek love songs on the street, imagine the fear in doing a sexy Bessie Smith song out on a street corner as a woman. Men perform songs about their sexuality freely in public, but those gender stereotypes kick in hard and fast as soon as women start singing freely about their sexuality in public! Especially if it leaves men out altogether, as in lesbian comedy. I found that men's jokes about women's genitals were accepted, even by families. No one noticed. That is what men do. But you make a joke about men's genitals as a woman performer on the street, and the police are there within minutes! Testing these boundaries, I decided to sing sexy songs covered by Maria Muldaur and Bonnie Raitt, et al, instead of sad love songs by Joni Mitchell. I began to get large, clapping, stomping crowds like the men got. No longer was I surrounded by hippie men who wanted me to join their cult, or hippie "chicks" who could "relate, man." Respect for me doubled among my male performer peers. Ironically, I felt even more safe on the streets after asserting my sexuality in my music, like the men. I felt more like a rapist's dream with the meek singing act, than as an in-control, bawdy, woman.

But singing about sex with men, in songs like "Women Be Wise," still does not rock the boat, as it is still male-centered. Issues of pregnancy, birth control, child care, women's sexual fulfillment, and lesbianism, DO rock the boat. Until the insertion of feminist material into my act, all loved me. No one cared if men balled all night, or if women cried in longing all night. But singing about women having sex together with other women all night, and not crying over men, was suspected criminal activity! Not only were authorities called in, but my own male performer peers backed up in confusion too.
I received 8 "peace disturbance/obscenity" tickets in Santa Cruz, Ca. for busking. This happened while the famous busker Artis, the Spoonman, was screaming, "Give Me Back My Foreskin!" in his street performances up the street. I was ticketed for the word "penis," when I said in my act, "What do you get when you cross a penis with a potato? A dictator." I got another ticket for the word "bitch" in a song lyric saying, "Girls have got to act a certain way, or else, they ain't A-OK, always be willing, never get mad, or they call us bitch, they tell us we're bad." Interestingly, that same song was later used in Seattle, Wa., at the Pike Place Market, as potential grounds for banning my performances there. The double-standard for obscenity on the streets for men and women became painfully apparent after I fought off 8 obscenity tickets with the ACLU in Santa Cruz, and attended hearings to fight for my free speech rights in Seattle.
   
After seeing that double-standard, my whole performing career came into focus. Police are present to reinforce societal norms, and the status quo. And it is not clear where the status quo stands on solo women street performers. Much less, solo women street performers who make fun of the sacred male genitalia, and talk about women-centered sexuality and other dangerous feminist issues. Some would ban solo women street performers altogether if they could. Some have tried that with me. Others would allow solo women street performers, but would censor their material to be male-centered. That has been tried on me too. In 1989, I was so sick of being hassled by police for performing, I put on a nun's habit, thinking it would confuse the public. I was not sure if the public would side with a cop or a nun, but I found the nun's habit effectively intimidated police. I have not been ticketed once since I have performed as a nun, and I can do material that is MUCH more racy than I ever did before! My journey as a street performer continues on, but it is a different journey than my predominantly male peers', for many reasons. The biggest reason being the lingering gender stereotypes in our society.