So, this just happened in celebration of International Women’s Day:
“The question isn’t who’s going to let me; it’s who is going to stop me.”
– Ayn Rand. Happy International Women's Day pic.twitter.com/DWQ3wlGoVY— P!nk (@Pink) March 8, 2015
Really, Pink? Because Ayn Rand isn’t exactly what you’d call a feminist.
Let’s flash-back to when the retailer Forever 21 was forced to pull T-shirts with this very same Rand (mis)quote after feminist anger:
https://twitter.com/alyssabereznak/status/532368560643772417
Forever 21 is selling [misquoted] Ayn Rand t-shirts: http://t.co/nc7DR7OGrc h/t @junipercyn pic.twitter.com/QnjBhjy6If
— danielle tcholakian (@danielleiat) November 12, 2014
.@maureenoco on how Rand became re-contextualized as a feminist by Pinterest & Forever 21 http://t.co/K6LvVld5Iq Ayn Rand, Girl-Power Icon
— Olsy Sorokina (@OlsySpeak) November 13, 2014
Barf, forever 21 selling shirts with Ayn Rand quotes. pic.twitter.com/TCh9lUgVTU
— Sophia Banks (@sophiaphotos) November 12, 2014
Here’s the actual quote from Rand’s novel “The Fountainhead” that Pink is referencing:
“Do you mean to tell me that you’re thinking seriously of building that way, when and if you are an architect?”
“Yes.”
“My dear fellow, who will let you?”
“That’s not the point. The point is, who will stop me?”
Yeah. That’s not quite what Pink was going for.
And even better, here’s how the Atlas Society describes Rand’s views on feminism:
Ayn Rand herself rejected the label “feminist” and even went so far as to provocatively declare herself a “male chauvinist.” In addition to her philosophical views per se, she had a view of sexual psychology that ascribed distinctive “masculine” and “feminine” attitudes to healthy men and women respectively. She argued that sexually, women should desire to engage in “hero worship,” and that this required having at least one man to whom they could each look up. For this reason she argued in her essay “About a Woman President” that a women should not want to be the commander-in-chief. However, she was clear to explain in that context that she nevertheless held that ability was not the basic issue: “women are not inferior to men in ability or intelligence…” Neither I nor any Objectivist thinker of note today thinks Rand’s psychological concepts of femininity and masculinity are integral to the philosophy of Objectivism.
What’s sad is the number of people who’ll read this and think Pink is spot-on with her Rand quote. Some examples:
@Pink morning !! 🙂 love this quote
— Santana SUPPORT♡ROWW (@MariaSthill95) March 8, 2015
https://twitter.com/pinkalwaysyou/status/574609387370733568
@Pink @AlexAllTimeLow fuck yeah
— alex |-/ (@ODETOAFl) March 8, 2015
https://twitter.com/pinkslaysyou/status/574655297932902400
Hashtag activism at work.
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