The “bad feminist” moniker turns out to have a special magic-it allows Gay to resist the pressure to be perfect, and points out the irony of women fighting the sexist idea that they must be other than what they are (more beautiful, more agreeable, more maternal or professional or fill-in-the-blank), yet still demanding flawlessness from their feminist idols.
There is no effort to reconcile these inconsistencies. She thinks misogynist songs like “Blurred Lines” are catchy but writes an impassioned letter to the girls who say they would let Chris Brown hit them. “I am failing as a feminist … I am a mess of contradictions.” Gay, the author of one novel, An Untamed State, which came out in May 2014, despises rape jokes but loves crappy exploitative television.
“I am failing as a woman,” she writes, half seriously.
