Hard to begin this post, so much to say.
There was a turning point for me when it comes to feminism. It was in 2017. I had just moved to LA from NYC. I met a man who I had some people in common with, and I went home with him. Usually having people common is a good sign, but this time it wasn’t.
He stealthed me. If you don’t know what that is, it’s when a man penetrates a woman (stealthily so) without wearing a condom, when she’s explicitly asked him to wear one. Legally, it’s considered rape. I didn’t know that then.
That event pushed me over the edge. I had tolerated a lot of bad behavior before, but I absolutely couldn’t any longer. I became 100% intolerant of having any tiny little boundary pushed by a man. I found the words to set boundaries in a graceful and dignified manner by practicing in the mirror; but I wasn’t always graceful and dignified. At first, the transgressions I’d experienced by men felt so cumulative; one man couldn’t mess up without bearing the burden of all the previous men’s offenses. I straddled the line between reactive, shut down, bitchy, and dismissive. I believe there’s a time and a place for everything, but these qualities don’t always get you what you want.
I remember really struggling with the idea that I might have to shift some of my own behavior to protect myself. I’m naturally a warm person, but when my male therapist suggested that I might need to tone down that aspect of my personality, I was horrified. I despised the idea that I needed to adjust myself to relieve men of their natural urges to sexually harass me. I also didn’t want to be initially perceived as cold or bitchy. I realize now that that’s people-pleasing at its finest.
Eventually I decided to give weight to the possibility that I may need better boundaries. It’s funny, because in the way that [my first single] Fortress is about bringing walls down in moments of intimacy and connection, Nice Girl is much more about building them. And that is what I did. I became a lot more careful and intentional about my signaling to men. I stopped embracing men in certain business settings. A handshake is just fine. I stopped discussing my sexuality or going into a private setting early in the dating process. And I have to be honest, I began to consciously downplay my sexuality.
Some feminists will be angry reading this. Some will say I’m taking undue responsibility for something men should in fact be responsible for. Some will call the changes I’ve made ridiculous. Some will say you can downplay your sexuality all you want, but men will still find a way to sexualize you (e.g. Billie Eilish). They’re not wrong. I’m doing what I have to do in this moment to protect my soul and my spirit, because nothing changes overnight. I have boundaries now, when I’m not sure I had many to begin with. I used to be such an open book, so it was much easier to get burned. I’m having hard conversations with men in my life on these topics. But as many of the current social and civil rights movements assert, it’s not on me to educate or change men.
I’ve also learned to measure my responses and reactions appropriately to a situation. Not every transgression is best handled by me losing my shit. Some boundaries can be set calmly, and are in fact better respected when done so.
The other major piece of the Nice Girl video is about rejecting societal norms and pressures. Let me come right out and say, I’m not immune to these. I feel them, I see them, I smell them. There were a lot of years where I injured myself repeatedly at the gym while trying to achieve an 'ideal body' for the industry. To this day I deal with chronic pain from these injuries.
Nice Girl asks, how do I embrace myself as I am rather than putting myself through torturous procedures and regimens, only to never be satisfied with how I look? How do I resist the pressures to look a certain way, when I’ve been taught that that is how I’m supposed to look? How do I reprogram deeply ingrained beauty standards when they go as far back as grade school? (I can sing the ‘Venus’ razor jingle verbatim, and yes I used those razors.)
Confession: I still think armpit hair on myself looks… ugh. I’ve been working on shifting this for a long time—I’ve come to embrace it on other women, even find it attractive, but there’s an element of disgust it still brings up when it’s my own. And this bothers me to no end. I think I’ve had a really hard time parsing out my own beliefs from those imposed by external societal pressures, and it’s still a process. Nice Girl asserts that whatever I choose to do, it’s not going be for men’s pleasure; it’s for my own. For me in this moment, it’s really about evaluating, then shifting, the internal conversations and beliefs I hold.
My hope for Nice Girl is to empower women to do what they want when they want, stand up for themselves, and scream No. I’ve learned that No is a powerful word that needs to make up a greater part of our vocabulary. So sing it from the rooftops, ladies: If I wanted to be pretty for you, I’d be a Nice Girl!!!
<3
