Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff Mom Never Told You. From how Supports
Speaker 1: dot com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Kristen
Speaker 1: and I'm Caroline, and today we are going to swear.
Speaker 1: It's gonna be the most swearing podcast in the history
Speaker 1: of stuff Mom Never told you bitches. That's right, I
Speaker 1: got it out of the way. Yeah, get out of
Speaker 1: the way. We're not swearing just willy nilly. We're very
Speaker 1: specifically swearing, yes, because this episode is all about the
Speaker 1: word bitch. And we figured since we have cited Bitch
Speaker 1: magazine so many times on the podcast, we can say bitch.
Speaker 1: We we have said that, we've done the whole it
Speaker 1: rhymes with a witch thing so many times on the podcast.
Speaker 1: But you know what where we can say it now? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean if people can say it on evening television shows, yeah,
Speaker 1: then so can we. This is a prime time podcast.
Speaker 1: So one of the reasons why we've been thinking about
Speaker 1: bitch and bitches, which, by the way, Caroline, I feel
Speaker 1: I got a little bit not saying it already so
Speaker 1: many times on the podcast. And hey, if anyone wants
Speaker 1: to go ahead and make it a drinking game, um,
Speaker 1: because we're gonna say bitch a lot. Uh and it
Speaker 1: speaking of drinking games, it will be preferable if it's
Speaker 1: a pumpkin spice latte drinking game. Because the reason we
Speaker 1: have really been thinking about it is because of the
Speaker 1: basic bitch. She has brought bitch back into the forefront
Speaker 1: of our pop cultural vernacular. But she's not such a
Speaker 1: new bitch in town, but now we just have a
Speaker 1: label for her. Yeah. I was actually I feel like
Speaker 1: I've said this on the podcast before, but I'm so
Speaker 1: far removed from like pop culture stuff of the day,
Speaker 1: So I actually did not hear the term basic bitch
Speaker 1: until I was perusing Twitter one day and somebody pointed
Speaker 1: out that Marie Claire had called out Lauren Conrad for
Speaker 1: being a basic bitch. And I was like, I what,
Speaker 1: I don't know, why is everyone upset? What's happening? So
Speaker 1: I went to Marie Claire saw this division because at
Speaker 1: first I was like, well, did they just have a
Speaker 1: problem with her? Like, what's the issue? It was an
Speaker 1: entire section and Marie Claire dedicated to talking about types
Speaker 1: of women that they didn't like, and there were all
Speaker 1: different types of women who were stupid or you would
Speaker 1: want to avoid for various reasons, but the Basic Bitch
Speaker 1: was one of them, and Lauren Conrad was their poster child.
Speaker 1: I do agree that Lauren Conrad is basic, but it's
Speaker 1: kind of funny that l C from Laguna Beach. Um,
Speaker 1: if anyone watched that back in high school like I did,
Speaker 1: that she is sort of a poster child for the
Speaker 1: Basic Bitch. Because basic bitches really got their start in
Speaker 1: hip hop. Um it's first mentioned an Urban Dictionary appeared
Speaker 1: in and it was more a thing of uh dudes
Speaker 1: talking about basic bitches is like women they would not
Speaker 1: want to go out with. Maybe they'd have sex with them,
Speaker 1: I don't know, but they surely wouldn't tell anyone about them.
Speaker 1: But then it was really Crashan in two thousand eleven
Speaker 1: with her hit Gucci Gucci that brought Basic Bitch into
Speaker 1: the mainstream because she wraps all about how she doesn't
Speaker 1: like basic bitches because they just wear what they think
Speaker 1: they should, like Gucci. But but I mean, like, I'd
Speaker 1: just like to to bring myself up again because I
Speaker 1: like how this song came out in twenty eleven Kristen,
Speaker 1: and it took until toward the end of for me
Speaker 1: to be like, oh, that's a thing, Caroline, I don't
Speaker 1: know if that makes you basic or something beyond basic.
Speaker 1: I'm a triple B. So today, a few years down
Speaker 1: the line, basic bitches could be defined by the people
Speaker 1: who use the term basic bitches. Okay, so keep that
Speaker 1: in mind as women who enjoy mediocre things, and mediocre
Speaker 1: in the sense of you know what these cooler people
Speaker 1: who can even label other people as basic would consider mediocre,
Speaker 1: such as on trend retail fashions, particularly Starbucks, pumpkin spice lattes,
Speaker 1: and just general pop culture, especially Taylor Swift. I mean
Speaker 1: she's she's Lauren Conrad. I mean that's sort of that
Speaker 1: sort of sums it up. But I gotta say though,
Speaker 1: when it comes to the basic bitch, her her calling
Speaker 1: cards are the latte is, also yoga pants, people on tops,
Speaker 1: the color pink, long hair, enjoying sex in the city,
Speaker 1: all of which, Caroline, I'm going to admit right now,
Speaker 1: those are things present in my life that I do enjoy. Um. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I wear people on p bowl I do, all right.
Speaker 1: Do I feel a little strange about it sometimes because
Speaker 1: it is like wearing a tiny dress that comes down
Speaker 1: to your hip bones. Yes, um, but on top of that.
Speaker 1: There's also and this is my favorite aspect of basic
Speaker 1: bitchery is Marilyn Roe quotes Marilyn Monroe probably never said
Speaker 1: so it just starts to get a little snarky. It's
Speaker 1: nearly getting snarky. It's it's super snark. And while I
Speaker 1: was surprised at the meanness with which Marie Claire treated
Speaker 1: Lauren Conrad, I do appreciate snark. I just, you know,
Speaker 1: have to roll my eyes at some of this sometimes.
Speaker 1: But Narene Malone over at The Cut was writing about
Speaker 1: how this whole basic bitch thing is actually a misogynistic
Speaker 1: insult that serves to uphold a male hierarchy of culture,
Speaker 1: because when you look at the hallmarks of this basic
Speaker 1: bitch character, it's really kind of revolving around an unabashed
Speaker 1: femininity in a lot of ways. Yeah, because basic bitches
Speaker 1: are proud of loving Taylor Sweft, they all listen to
Speaker 1: shake it off without their headphones on, and they won't care.
Speaker 1: They won't care about all of the pumpkin spice jokes
Speaker 1: that roll around every single fall. Now, um and she
Speaker 1: Malone writes, it's all enough to make you wonder if
Speaker 1: what people are actually really interested in is permission to
Speaker 1: use the noun and not the adjective, because she goes
Speaker 1: on to say, I mean, at least a basic bitch,
Speaker 1: which is called a bit a bitch, and not have
Speaker 1: to qualify it in this kind of way. Um, But
Speaker 1: I think it's an interesting jumping off point for this
Speaker 1: conversation about bitch because to me, it represents how far
Speaker 1: this word has come to the point that there are
Speaker 1: even subcategories of bitches and it. Yeah, but even still,
Speaker 1: just by virtue of using it, even if it is
Speaker 1: kind of in a tongue in she snarky sort of way,
Speaker 1: there is always the reservation of well, is this ultimately
Speaker 1: just a horribly misogynistic term that is harmful to women? Yeah?
Speaker 1: I mean. One commenter on that article from Narine Malone
Speaker 1: pointed out that denoting the basic bitch like well, denoting
Speaker 1: the super average woman as a basic bitch is the
Speaker 1: same thing as calling a super average sports loving guy
Speaker 1: a bro. But it's just the equivalent. But of course,
Speaker 1: you know, bro isn't using any type of loaded, historically
Speaker 1: loaded term like basic bitches. Well, and there's an interesting
Speaker 1: thing too about the bro in that I think bros
Speaker 1: genuinely embrace their broedom. Yeah, whereas basic bitches, well, I
Speaker 1: guess they are coming to the point of embracing being basic.
Speaker 1: They might be embracing those things like Taylor Swift and
Speaker 1: yoga pants, but are they embracing the term? Do they
Speaker 1: know they are basic bitches? According to my YouTube search, Uh,
Speaker 1: they do. I think that. I think that some do
Speaker 1: where it as a badge of pride, which only adds
Speaker 1: another layer of fascination to me for this whole word bitch.
Speaker 1: So let's step away from the basic bitch because she's
Speaker 1: got to get to yoga anyway. Um This all leads
Speaker 1: us up to the question of whether bitch is reclaimable
Speaker 1: and empowering because, as I say the top of the podcast,
Speaker 1: we often have cited Bitch magazine, which is a super
Speaker 1: feminist publication. Um or is it always ultimately insulting? Which
Speaker 1: isn't so easy to answer because bitch today has so
Speaker 1: many different meanings. It can be in now and it
Speaker 1: can be a verb, it can be an adjective. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so some of the meanings. I mean, we could just
Speaker 1: list these for a while because I feel like it's
Speaker 1: it's so multifaceted. But maybe you're a lewd, malicious, or
Speaker 1: irritating woman. Maybe you are just a strong, assertive, independent woman,
Speaker 1: that's right. Maybe you're using the word for your best
Speaker 1: friend as a term of endearment. Maybe you're calling a
Speaker 1: man that you consider to be a woos. I don't
Speaker 1: like that one. A bitch. Yeah, it could be a verb.
Speaker 1: You could be complaining, you know, bitching. Uh, you could
Speaker 1: be whimping out, so you're you're gonna bitch out. It
Speaker 1: could be your surfing and that is just bitching. That's right.
Speaker 1: So where did this word come from? Thankfully we have
Speaker 1: a wonderful history or bitch story that really doesn't work. Um.
Speaker 1: This is coming from Claire Bliley's excellent essay bitch a History,
Speaker 1: with some help from an Encyclopedia of Swearing by Jeffrey
Speaker 1: Hughes and fun fact people. It has the longest history
Speaker 1: among animal terms as an insult. Yeah. I super enjoyed
Speaker 1: reading the history and the evolution of this word. If
Speaker 1: you look back into the fourteenth century, it originated as
Speaker 1: a slur referencing promiscuous or sensual women. Because of course
Speaker 1: it referenced a female dog, a bitch and heat, but
Speaker 1: it was more of a male gendered insult at the time. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it was likely derived as an insult from the connection
Speaker 1: between the goddess Diana or Artemis and her hunting dogs,
Speaker 1: and it resulted from a Christian attempt to quote suppress
Speaker 1: the sacred feminine and deter pagan followers of Diana. What
Speaker 1: I had no idea. Yeah, so many layers before bitch
Speaker 1: was bitch. Ancient Greeks and Romans compared women to dogs
Speaker 1: and heat as a sexist slur already. And so even
Speaker 1: before you had the word for it, women were already
Speaker 1: being compared to sort of crazy, out of control, sexually
Speaker 1: promiscuous animals golden retrievers. Well, so yeah, and then you
Speaker 1: have the old English word for it, which was derived
Speaker 1: itself from the Norse word for female dogs. So yeah,
Speaker 1: you never quite get away from comparing women too out
Speaker 1: of control animals. But you know, we mentioned a second
Speaker 1: ago that even though it focused on we have sexually
Speaker 1: promiscus women and dogs that were in heat, it was
Speaker 1: more of a male focused insult. And that's because of
Speaker 1: the term son of a bitch, because that originated to
Speaker 1: ridicule the spiritual pagans who worshiped the quote unquote bitch
Speaker 1: goddess Diana, who herself sometimes would turn into a dog
Speaker 1: along with her dogs, and it evolved to mean a
Speaker 1: hateful man. Yeah. Shakespeare actually uses it only as a
Speaker 1: male directed insult in his writings. And what worse though,
Speaker 1: could a man be than to be compared to a
Speaker 1: dirty female animal. Yeah, obviously this man that you're referring
Speaker 1: to came from questionable, dirty origins. So so in eighteenth
Speaker 1: century it really began to develop into being a female
Speaker 1: targeted insult, almost exclusively. So for instance, in five the
Speaker 1: Classical Dictionary of the Modern Tongue described it as the
Speaker 1: most offensive appellation that can be given to an English woman,
Speaker 1: even more provoking than that a whole Yeah, and of
Speaker 1: course this forces poor dog people to find different names
Speaker 1: for their female dog, so you know it's although you know,
Speaker 1: dog people still definitely call female dogs bitches. I can
Speaker 1: say this a friend of mine, his mother is super
Speaker 1: duper dog person. But it forced dog people to use
Speaker 1: euphemisms like dog guests, lady dog, she dog, and puppy's mother,
Speaker 1: although of course terms like that still infiltrated insults for
Speaker 1: women and men who came from questionable origins. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: it's in the nineteen twenties Lately writes that the raw
Speaker 1: eyes of the use of bitch to insult women really begins,
Speaker 1: and she notes that it's probably not a coincidence that
Speaker 1: this is happening right around the passage of the nineteenth Amendment,
Speaker 1: when women get the vote enfranchise men is happening um So.
Speaker 1: For instance, in nineteen fifteen, the use of bitch in
Speaker 1: literature is exclusively limited to dog references, and this is
Speaker 1: based off a Google in Graham search that Bailey conducted
Speaker 1: um so looking at all sorts of books. But then
Speaker 1: just fifteen years later, in nineteen thirty, references to bitch
Speaker 1: as an insult to women out number the canine references.
Speaker 1: It's almost as if people were eager for a way
Speaker 1: to really insult women. Yeah, but so if you are
Speaker 1: looking at different uses of it in different connotations. In
Speaker 1: nineteen fifty seven, that's when we get the surfer slang
Speaker 1: bitchen for awesome, because one of our sources, I think
Speaker 1: it was the Encyclopedia, was talking about how different slurs
Speaker 1: and slang words and curse words have different meanings and
Speaker 1: connotations in different cultures, like the same way that bloody
Speaker 1: is awful in the UK, but means absolutely nothing here
Speaker 1: and all of our British listeners just turned off the
Speaker 1: podcast Lets Your pearls Well. In the nineteen sixties there
Speaker 1: was a reclamation of bitch along with second wave feminism. UM.
Speaker 1: In general, its use was pretty steady until about nineteen
Speaker 1: sixty five, when it's used shot up and just for
Speaker 1: a little bit of context. The Feminine Mystique by Betty
Speaker 1: for Dan was published in nineteen sixty three seminal second
Speaker 1: wave text, and it was also the final report of
Speaker 1: the Presidential Commission on the Status of Women, which came
Speaker 1: out in nineteen sixty five as well. And then three
Speaker 1: years later, in nineteen sixty eight, leading second wave feminist
Speaker 1: Joe Freeman publishes this in credible document called the Bitch
Speaker 1: Manifesto and bitches in all caps because she wants it
Speaker 1: to denote an organization that has yet to be developed,
Speaker 1: but she really devotes the paper to talking about what
Speaker 1: a bitch is. It's an incredible read. I was sort
Speaker 1: of blown over by it. Um. She writes. Basically, she's
Speaker 1: talking in the context of the idea that that is
Speaker 1: so pervasive in our culture that humanity is male, whereas
Speaker 1: female as other so basically gender equals female in a
Speaker 1: lot of cases. But she writes that bitches refused to serve,
Speaker 1: honor or obey anyone. They demand to be fully functioning
Speaker 1: human beings, not just shadows. They want to be both
Speaker 1: female and human. And one of the things she notes
Speaker 1: too in her very detailed description of bitches is how
Speaker 1: they tend to make people uncomfortable because of an inherent
Speaker 1: androgeny of not being fully female in a sense of
Speaker 1: like playing up that feminine gender performance to the inn degree,
Speaker 1: while also embracing some of that masculine gender performance in
Speaker 1: the sense of being abrasive and assertive and independent. Right. Well, so,
Speaker 1: when we get into the nineteen nineties, there is a
Speaker 1: further feminist reclamation of the word bitch along with its
Speaker 1: use in hip hop. For instance, we see the first
Speaker 1: publishing of Bitch magazine, which we do site so often
Speaker 1: in the podcast, and they were very clear that they
Speaker 1: definitely purposely chose that name to reclaim the word. But
Speaker 1: also at this time it's not being used just as
Speaker 1: a word for feminists like the publishers of Bitch, who
Speaker 1: are really seeking to reclaim it in that sense that
Speaker 1: Joe Freeman outlines in nineteen sixty eight. But it's also
Speaker 1: taking on a new level of self labeling among women,
Speaker 1: not to denote outsider status or not being thrown at
Speaker 1: women in order to force them into outsider status linguistically,
Speaker 1: but also being just claimed by women who want to
Speaker 1: be thought of as strong and independent, who are still
Speaker 1: shopping at Bloomingdale's perhaps and socialize and they're just they're
Speaker 1: just bit just Yeah, Suddenly it's more normalized almost that
Speaker 1: you know, you're not just what society considers an angry feminist.
Speaker 1: Suddenly you're just you know, you can embrace the word
Speaker 1: too as some woman who's not considered a radical. So
Speaker 1: those were the original basic bitches. Yeah, I think so
Speaker 1: it sounds like it. Um. Also, this is when it's
Speaker 1: starting to get a lot more attention from critics of
Speaker 1: gangster rap in particular because obviously the use of bitch
Speaker 1: and wrap is something that's been talked to about a
Speaker 1: lot in terms of how rap and hip hop uh
Speaker 1: talk about and treat women, and also involved descriptions of
Speaker 1: violence toward women, because a lot of times in when
Speaker 1: it's men wrapping about bitches, it is usually pretty violent
Speaker 1: and very sexually explicit or it's an angry uh use
Speaker 1: of bitch in the sense of a woman who will
Speaker 1: not offer herself sexually to a man. But two and
Speaker 1: we'll get into this a little bit more, um in
Speaker 1: just a minute. Female mcs are also though, using bitch
Speaker 1: in similar in all so different ways and rap as
Speaker 1: well at the time. Well, so then it's when we
Speaker 1: get into the two thousands the aughts that we see
Speaker 1: bitch used in a couple of different ways. Um. It's
Speaker 1: being used a lot more as a term for a wimpy,
Speaker 1: feminized man, but also women are using it self referentially
Speaker 1: and among their friends. And of course we can't forget
Speaker 1: that Britney Spears song after she returned from her mental
Speaker 1: breakdown where she announces herself by saying, it's Brittany bitch.
Speaker 1: And with that, we're going to take a quick break
Speaker 1: and we'll come right back to talk about the rise
Speaker 1: of bitch on television. And now back to the show.
Speaker 1: So when we left off, it was the two thousands,
Speaker 1: Brittaney was back bitch, and it was on the rise
Speaker 1: on TV as well. In fact, The New York Times
Speaker 1: reported that its use tripled from four uses on one
Speaker 1: hundred three primetime shows to almost thirteen hundred uses on
Speaker 1: six eight five shows in two thousand seven. So bitches
Speaker 1: are everywhere on TV. What's going on with that? Well,
Speaker 1: basically with the court helped out a little bit in
Speaker 1: the Second Circuit Court of Appeals nipped the FCCS regulatory
Speaker 1: powers against quote unquote fleeting expletives. And this unleashed a
Speaker 1: whole ton of bitches. And this is, according to the l. A. Times,
Speaker 1: um because they weren't they still weren't going to use
Speaker 1: the F word. They're still not going to use the
Speaker 1: C word, but bitches in that happy medium. Yeah. The l. A.
Speaker 1: Times writer described bitch as quote a hard working multitasker,
Speaker 1: happy to switch from now into verbs pejorative to endearment,
Speaker 1: even female to mail with the flip of an inflection.
Speaker 1: So it's not surprising that the B word is tossed
Speaker 1: about with the most abandoned in comedies, often though not exclusively,
Speaker 1: those written by women. But of course there's the issue
Speaker 1: of the majority of show runners and writers and producers
Speaker 1: and uh executives still being men. And so there's the
Speaker 1: bait thereof well, is this really a woman driven trend
Speaker 1: or is this just more male writers finding ways to
Speaker 1: work in pejorative words. Well, I also thought it was
Speaker 1: interesting that bitch is considered such a funny word. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's very much a punchline in the way that other
Speaker 1: words that we can't say on this podcast right now
Speaker 1: are maybe harder to make light of because they're so
Speaker 1: they're so harsh almost all the time. But by the
Speaker 1: time we get into when was that second court decision
Speaker 1: in two thousand eleven, by that point, bitch is taken
Speaker 1: on so many different meanings, whereas a lot of other
Speaker 1: of you know, George Carlin's seven words you Can't say,
Speaker 1: are far more inflexible. Um. But the rise of bitch
Speaker 1: and use of bitch in music is also interesting to
Speaker 1: look at because most of the focus has been on
Speaker 1: rap and hip hop, but if you go all the
Speaker 1: way back to early R and B and even out
Speaker 1: law country music, it shows up in there as well. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we have Jelly Roll Morton, who sang some saltier songs
Speaker 1: containing the word bitch. Partly is a way to masculinize
Speaker 1: himself away from the image of the feminine piano player
Speaker 1: in New Orleans, because a lot of piano players in
Speaker 1: New Orleans at the time were women. Um, and you
Speaker 1: know some female contemporaries of his, we're doing the same
Speaker 1: thing using that word. But when we look at the
Speaker 1: contemporary music scene, and we've talked about hip hop getting
Speaker 1: a lot of heat using the word bitch, but it's
Speaker 1: important to remember that a lot of female rappers use
Speaker 1: the word bitch and also wear the word with pride. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so you have just two examples of Little Kim calling
Speaker 1: yourself queen bitch, and we're recently Nicki Minaj as the
Speaker 1: Baddest bitch because there is I mean, that's just another
Speaker 1: one of its manifold meanings of Yeah, I'm a bitch,
Speaker 1: I'm I'm the top I'm the top dog. I'm the
Speaker 1: top dog is if you will, um. But what is
Speaker 1: really fascinating was how in two thousand and twelve, Lupe
Speaker 1: Fiasco releases this single UM called Bitch Bad that got
Speaker 1: a lot of people talking about the use of bitch
Speaker 1: and hip hop because in the song he attempts to
Speaker 1: break down hip hop's bitch problem and he talks about
Speaker 1: how like bitch is bad and ladies better, and he
Speaker 1: though ends up coming across kind of blaming women for it.
Speaker 1: Especially the way it's set up in the music video
Speaker 1: where it's a girl hearing her mom used the word bitch,
Speaker 1: rather than really focusing on how men often use it
Speaker 1: to refer to women in the more inflexible way of
Speaker 1: being a difficult woman. Um, but I gotta give him
Speaker 1: props so for at least trying. I mean, and and
Speaker 1: he said that too. He's like, I mean, I'm starting
Speaker 1: a conversation about it. This clearly needs to be talked about. Well, yeah, mean,
Speaker 1: but wasn't it. Right after that, the Kanye West made
Speaker 1: a song for Kim Kardashian following her, the Perfect Bitch. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but again though, I mean like and we could also
Speaker 1: at this point mentioned how with Beyonce, the fact that
Speaker 1: in her song Flawless, the hook is about down bitches.
Speaker 1: That is often thrown out as um some people's rationale
Speaker 1: for not believing when she calls herself a feminist, because
Speaker 1: how could she use the term bitch? Oh, it just complicated, Caroline,
Speaker 1: It just complicated, And it's so loaded. It's such a
Speaker 1: loaded term, Yeah, because it, I mean, it could really
Speaker 1: mean anything. If you write bitch in sharpie on a
Speaker 1: piece of paper and just handed to someone and asked
Speaker 1: him what it means. It could be so many different things. Yeah, absolutely,
Speaker 1: And I mean, well, obviously have to look at the
Speaker 1: gender divide and what's going on there In terms of
Speaker 1: the use of the word um. Timothy Jay's book Cursing
Speaker 1: in America found that bitch is the number one curse
Speaker 1: word used by women, but it's number six for men,
Speaker 1: which is really interesting that women use it, I would say,
Speaker 1: so much more often than men, But it might be
Speaker 1: because when men use it, it rarely tends to be complimentary,
Speaker 1: because between women bitch can be sort of an in
Speaker 1: group term of affection, whereas I think it is understandably
Speaker 1: and this kind of came up to in our conversation
Speaker 1: about lady um. There there are a lot of parallels
Speaker 1: actually between these two words and in the question of reclamation.
Speaker 1: But I think it's a lot more challenging for a
Speaker 1: guy to walk stay into his you know, the break
Speaker 1: room of the workplace, and see a group of female
Speaker 1: co workers and say hey, bitches and it not make
Speaker 1: a record scratch. Well, then, I mean that gets into
Speaker 1: issues of sexuality and sexual orientation and the way that
Speaker 1: you identify and the way that other people identify you
Speaker 1: because I have heard gay male friends use it both
Speaker 1: for women and for other gay male friends, and nobody
Speaker 1: bats an eyelash. But yeah, like you said, if if
Speaker 1: the straight man were to walk in the room with
Speaker 1: a bunch of women and say it, I think they
Speaker 1: were just like you could hear a pin drop. What
Speaker 1: what do you mean by that, um, Because a lot
Speaker 1: of times when it is directed at a woman, particularly
Speaker 1: by let's say a straight dude, it usually is that
Speaker 1: harsher sort of original bitch of describing a woman acting
Speaker 1: against the expectations of her feminine role. Whereas when it's
Speaker 1: directed when it's guys directing at other guys, especially like
Speaker 1: straight guys to straight guys um, or straight guys to
Speaker 1: gay guys, it's usually subordinating. There's actually a two thousand
Speaker 1: five New York Times article on the rise of quote
Speaker 1: little bitch and the male directed bitch um, which really
Speaker 1: started it with the HBO show OZ, which started in
Speaker 1: because that gets into the prison lingo and uh, male
Speaker 1: prisoners being other male prisoners little bitches. Yeah, and then
Speaker 1: it's interesting to see the way that characters on television,
Speaker 1: but I mean also culturally kind of distanced themselves from
Speaker 1: any threat of perceived homo eroticism. Um. In the paper
Speaker 1: reclaiming critical analysis the social Harms of Bitch, the writer
Speaker 1: says that even with the let's hug it out bitch
Speaker 1: quote on Entourage, the word bitch is a tool for
Speaker 1: distancing themselves from homeoroticism. In other words, when men are
Speaker 1: doing something like hugging it out, when you throw that
Speaker 1: word in there, it's like, oh, you know, we're just
Speaker 1: we're all just kidding. Yeah, I'm gonna hug you. I
Speaker 1: don't want to kiss you, So don't get it twisted,
Speaker 1: which reminds me of this quote from that two thousand
Speaker 1: five New York Times articles saying the word that wants
Speaker 1: to find a misogynistic double standard. If a man is asserted,
Speaker 1: he's called ambitious. If a woman is assertive, she's a bitch.
Speaker 1: Now defines another, If a woman is called a bitch,
Speaker 1: she's powerful, formidable, a winner. But if a man's called
Speaker 1: a bitch, he's shamefully weak. And she also cited the
Speaker 1: premiere of the classic teen drama primetime show The o
Speaker 1: C in which bitch is the main character. I forget
Speaker 1: his name right now, but I can remember his brooding glance.
Speaker 1: Uh he's called bitch twice, and I think Misha Barton's
Speaker 1: character like at the end of it is like, welcome
Speaker 1: to the c bitch, and thus it begins, Uh well yeah.
Speaker 1: But so then when we look at women's use of it,
Speaker 1: You're right, it is all over the place in terms
Speaker 1: of the way we use it. So it makes sense
Speaker 1: that it's our number one curse word and not for men.
Speaker 1: But it can be a term of endear aman. I mean,
Speaker 1: I remember my freshman roommate in college. That's how she
Speaker 1: referred to all of her close female friends. And I
Speaker 1: started doing it too, because you know, I was like, oh, well,
Speaker 1: this is great, we're friends. And then after uh we
Speaker 1: moved out, I was like, why did I ever do that?
Speaker 1: I never liked it. I did not like the use
Speaker 1: of bitches like a term for my friends. But I
Speaker 1: mean it could be everything from that friendly term of
Speaker 1: endearment to a feminist statement to referring to someone as
Speaker 1: angry or misogynistic. Yeah, I mean, clearly, As we mentioned
Speaker 1: with Joe Freeman's Bitch Manifesto in nine eight and also
Speaker 1: the magazine now Bitch, there is a close relationship between
Speaker 1: this word and feminism UM and speaking about the use
Speaker 1: of bitch as their intentional title UM for Bitch Magazine UH,
Speaker 1: the magazine's cove founder, Andy Ziesler wrote in The Washington Post,
Speaker 1: Let's not be disingenuous. Is it a bad word? Of
Speaker 1: course it is. As a culture, we've done everything possible
Speaker 1: to make sure of that, starting with a constantly perpetuated
Speaker 1: mindset that deems powerful women to be scary, angry and
Speaker 1: of course unfeminine, and sees uncompromising speech by women as
Speaker 1: anathema to a tidy, well run world. And she goes
Speaker 1: on to stay as Joe Freeman also said, to be
Speaker 1: called a bitch is ultimately a compliment, even if in
Speaker 1: those cases they say, even if you're labeled a bitch
Speaker 1: from someone who means it as you were being an angry,
Speaker 1: unpleasant woman who is acting out. Yeah, and Joe Freeman,
Speaker 1: I think definitely would not have appreciated or approved of
Speaker 1: today's basic bitches as we think of them in pop culture.
Speaker 1: She describes a bitch as being a revolutionary. These are
Speaker 1: the women who helped us get the vote. These are
Speaker 1: the women who first went to college, you know. These
Speaker 1: are the women who have led the feminist movement and
Speaker 1: risen to the top of fortune companies. Um, so you know,
Speaker 1: she absolutely thinks that it is a positive term because
Speaker 1: it's a positive concept. Yeah, but not everybody agrees. Not surprisingly. Um,
Speaker 1: we sited just a minute ago the paper Reclaiming Critical
Speaker 1: Analysis the Social Harms of Bitch by Cheryl Kleinman, Matthew
Speaker 1: b Zl, and A. Corey Frost, and in it they
Speaker 1: argue that bitch cannot be effectively reclaimed because of its
Speaker 1: inherently misogynistic baggage, which reminds me so much, Caroline of
Speaker 1: our podcast on the word lady, because there are a
Speaker 1: lot of people, especially older women from second the second
Speaker 1: wave era, which is kind of ironic, who want nothing
Speaker 1: to do with lady whatsoever because of its baggage. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it has so much baggage. It meant something very very
Speaker 1: different to to the generation and the generations before, and
Speaker 1: so yeah, it is interesting to draw those parallels with
Speaker 1: the word bitch, especially when you have so many women
Speaker 1: who call their friends bitch or who claim the word
Speaker 1: for themselves just meaning like yeah, I'm strong and no
Speaker 1: I'm not going to take a back seat. Well, so
Speaker 1: these writers basically argue that any use of the word
Speaker 1: bitch hurts women. They say that when women are calling
Speaker 1: themselves bitch, it's just dawning what they refer to as
Speaker 1: an honorary man's status instead of pushing any actual gender
Speaker 1: equity forward. They say it's not part of a movement
Speaker 1: like feminism is self identifying as a bitch means you're
Speaker 1: no threat. It's that whole idea of like women policing themselves,
Speaker 1: women doing men's jobs in policing other women. And they
Speaker 1: said that, you know, if feminists want some empowering label
Speaker 1: to use to describe themselves, why don't they just call
Speaker 1: themselves feminists, to which I said, well, maybe because other
Speaker 1: people refer to feminists inherently as bitches. So like, I
Speaker 1: definitely see what they're saying. I mean, they say, quote,
Speaker 1: unlike the term feminist, which is tied to a movement
Speaker 1: for social change, bitch provides women only with false power,
Speaker 1: challenging neither men nor patriarchy. But to me, this also
Speaker 1: it seems like nothing can be reclaimed. I mean, what
Speaker 1: about the word queer, which in a lot of ways
Speaker 1: has absolutely been reclaimed from a very harmful slur that
Speaker 1: also has you know, a lot of baggage pass baggage
Speaker 1: tied to that, but it has been successfully reclaimed. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I mean talking about that, I mentioned the honorary
Speaker 1: man status. They they're claiming that young women are finding
Speaker 1: the use of the word cool because it's slang used
Speaker 1: by men. It's a tool of the patriarchy, and so
Speaker 1: basically women who use the word to self describe are
Speaker 1: delusional and don't know that they're being oppressed. But see,
Speaker 1: I also think, like, do you think that the women
Speaker 1: in a lot of ways, especially in the sense of
Speaker 1: how we sometimes use it casually among ourselves, as in
Speaker 1: like like in group speech among like groups of women
Speaker 1: and our friends, that we have repurposed it because we
Speaker 1: kind of say it sometimes in different ways than men do.
Speaker 1: Like our definitions of bitch. It's so much more flexible.
Speaker 1: I mean, I do I think you have to watch it, like, uh,
Speaker 1: being called a bitch as in like the harsh bitch
Speaker 1: is still I mean, that's that's a hard thing to
Speaker 1: be called. I am not immune to being called a bit.
Speaker 1: And yes, I have been called a bitch no surprise,
Speaker 1: um and saying it and when I have caught myself
Speaker 1: saying it in the same way I mean, it's um,
Speaker 1: it's one of the most insulting things I can think of. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I have actually, just in a short time since we
Speaker 1: were researching for this podcast and coming into the studio today,
Speaker 1: I have caught myself thinking that about another woman, like,
Speaker 1: oh god, she's a bitch? Are you trying to tell
Speaker 1: me something? But like literally stopping myself and being like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa?
Speaker 1: What do you mean? Did she just make you angry?
Speaker 1: Or did she do something that a man would have
Speaker 1: done And you would have just rolled your eyes at
Speaker 1: it if a man had done it, But because a
Speaker 1: woman is doing it, you think she's a bit. So
Speaker 1: I've had a lot of interesting conversations with myself on
Speaker 1: the toilet as I've thought about stuff this week. But
Speaker 1: also fascinating too though that if you were thinking that
Speaker 1: about a man, it would have also had a different meaning. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think the gender stuff with it too is so
Speaker 1: fascinating as well. Um, So I don't. I mean, honestly,
Speaker 1: I don't have a clear cut, um, some clear gut
Speaker 1: ethical guide to bitch, if that makes sense. I part
Speaker 1: of me, like that part of me see sees how
Speaker 1: it's hurtful I think basic bitch is part hilarious and
Speaker 1: also I see what Nourine Malone points out of, Well,
Speaker 1: what are we really talking about when we talk about
Speaker 1: basic bitches? Um? I don't know. Lady was an easier one. Lady.
Speaker 1: I can say, yep, I'm fine with lady. Yeah, but bitch.
Speaker 1: What do you think, Caroline? Um? I think, well, kind
Speaker 1: of like what I was just saying, I think that
Speaker 1: I have caught myself using it in so many different ways.
Speaker 1: I personally am not comfortable calling other women like as
Speaker 1: a term of endearment. I'm not comfortable with that. Um.
Speaker 1: I don't like it, and I don't want other women
Speaker 1: to call me like, hey, bitch, because I mean, I
Speaker 1: just don't like it. I have caught myself thinking about
Speaker 1: a male acquaintance of mine who is uh, he's rather
Speaker 1: on the uh stormy, tumultuous, moody side, and I have
Speaker 1: caught myself thinking about him as a bitch, and and
Speaker 1: then I'm just like, oh my god, the layers my
Speaker 1: brain is exploding. What does it all mean? Because you
Speaker 1: know what, then what does that say about me? What
Speaker 1: does that say about stereotypical perceptions of women? And then
Speaker 1: the use of the term for a guy who's moody.
Speaker 1: I just you know, yeah, And Joe Freeman's essay certainly
Speaker 1: made me think twice about how sensitive I have been
Speaker 1: to being called a bitch as an insult, you know, like, well, well,
Speaker 1: why don't I take it as a compliment. Well, because
Speaker 1: sometimes maybe I am just a bit and that's not pleasant. Well,
Speaker 1: we could go around and around and around with this,
Speaker 1: but now we need to hear from our listeners. Help
Speaker 1: us figure this out. What is the status of bitch?
Speaker 1: Let us know mom Stuff at how stuff works dot
Speaker 1: Com is our email address. You can also tweet us
Speaker 1: at mom Stuff podcast or messages on Facebook, and we've
Speaker 1: got a couple of Facebook messages to share with you
Speaker 1: when we come right back from a quick break and
Speaker 1: now back to the show. Okay, I have a letter
Speaker 1: here from Petra from Toronto. She says, I know one
Speaker 1: of your recent podcasts you mentioned doing an episode on
Speaker 1: female arm hair. I would like to encourage you to
Speaker 1: do that because arm hair is a subject I feel
Speaker 1: very conflicted about. As a matter of fact, I'm waiting
Speaker 1: right now for the wax to heat up so that
Speaker 1: my mom can help me wax my arms I've always
Speaker 1: been a very hairy girl, and it's caused me great embarrassment.
Speaker 1: In my teenage years, I've done everything under the sun
Speaker 1: to try to get rid of my hair. Arm hair
Speaker 1: included from simply shaving to getting laser hair removal treatments.
Speaker 1: I've resorted to waxing because it's cheaper than laser and
Speaker 1: doesn't lead the equally embarrassing stubble that shaving does. In
Speaker 1: my teenage years, I never thought twice about any feminist
Speaker 1: implications of getting rid of my arm hair. It was
Speaker 1: something that had to be done because I was so
Speaker 1: much hairier than the other girls, and I didn't want
Speaker 1: people to think I was gross. Now, I still feel
Speaker 1: disgusted by my arm hair, even though I think critically
Speaker 1: about beauty standards and was on women, and often wonder
Speaker 1: why I feel so strongly that I need to do this,
Speaker 1: whereas my brother doesn't. I know it's my choice whether
Speaker 1: to remove the hair, but I wish it felt like
Speaker 1: a fair one. Thanks for your time, love your work,
Speaker 1: and thank you Petra Well. I've got a Facebook message
Speaker 1: here from Morgan who writes, I just discovered your podcast
Speaker 1: and am hooked. I was scrolling through the recent ones
Speaker 1: and just listened to the Seafaring Ladies episode Her Deepness.
Speaker 1: Sylvia Earle comes up at the end, and you asked
Speaker 1: about oceanographers and marine biologists who know Dr Earle. Well,
Speaker 1: I don't personally know her, I wish. I am a
Speaker 1: marine biology master's student in San Francisco, and I've met
Speaker 1: and seen her a couple of times. The first time
Speaker 1: she was giving a short talk is part of the
Speaker 1: America's Cup Healthy Oceans project in summer. I actually got
Speaker 1: the privilege to meet her, do some small talk and
Speaker 1: get my picture take in. And I can't say that
Speaker 1: just being that close to her felt unreal because I
Speaker 1: couldn't help but think how much this person has impacted
Speaker 1: women in the marine sciences and science in general. And
Speaker 1: then thinking that she had actually lived on the ocean floor.
Speaker 1: I mean, what touching her made me feel almost like
Speaker 1: I was on one of her incredible ocean adventures for
Speaker 1: just an infinitesimal amount of time. Totally surreal moment. Thanks
Speaker 1: for creating great podcasts and talking about really interesting stuff. Well,
Speaker 1: thank you, Morgan, and thanks everybody who's written to us.
Speaker 1: Mom Stuff at house stuff works dot com is our
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Speaker 1: including this one with links to our sources so you
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