Weekend Review: Ani DiFranco and Susan Faludi

Perched upon the edges of their pink theater seats, the mostly female crowd eagerly anticipated the scheduled program of the night. The main event promised passionate conversation between two prominent feminists, facilitated by a renowned journalist who was highly versed in the topic herself.

The Billy Wilder Theater at the UCLA Hammer Museum was filled to capacity on Thursday for “Braving Backlash: Turning From Terror” ““ part of the Hammer’s Forum series ““ featuring Ani DiFranco, Susan Faludi and moderator Laura Flanders, all who have made their names known in popular culture with to their work toward empowering women. Faludi and Flanders are best known for their work as journalists and authors of highly critical books about the U.S. government, while DiFranco is a prolific musician, having released 19 records, and the owner of Righteous Babe Records.

The Forum series, which according to Flanders was created to “break the hypothetical wall between artists and creative works and politicians and journalists,” has been popular in the past; however, DiFranco’s participation at this particular event drew a larger turnout than usual and the normal one-hour Forum was extended to two.

Keeping the conversation on track and captivating, Flanders probed the details of each woman’s feminine psyche in order to determine their stance on feminism and current events. Topics ranged from Faludi’s latest book, “The Terror Dream: Fear and Fantasy in a Post 9/11 America,” which deals with the rise of anti-feminist sentiment after the events of Sept. 11, to which Democratic presidential candidate would be most sympathetic to equal and humane treatment of women both in the United States and the world.

Calling feminism “the F word,” DiFranco engaged the audience from the beginning with her eloquent answers about the struggles she had to face as a musician, and her personal views on the current news. DiFranco defined feminism as “an escape from patriarchy, the fundamental disease to which all social ills can be attributed to” and explained how her parents influenced her highly politically-active life. Treating the audience to recitations of her spoken works “God’s Country” and “Coming Up,” she discussed her musical career and her decision to run her own record label at 18 in order to avoid corporate interests and gain complete artistic freedom.

However, it was Susan Faludi who held the audience’s attention best. Faludi said her start in journalism arose from a sixth-grade incident where she was chastised by the PTA for her survey for the school newspaper that involved questions on abortion rights and legalization of marijuana. She had an arsenal of stories that she used to relate each discussion point to an actual event.

Although she did not outwardly declare her support for one Democratic candidate, she did voice a highly positive opinion of Barack Obama, citing that his less “machismo” attitude than previous candidates and elected officials actually made him more of a feminist than Hillary Clinton. Her comments sparked an interesting debate on the role of Bill Clinton in Hillary’s campaign and whether or not she would promote women’s agendas if elected president.

The Forum was then open to audience questions; however, due to the popularity of the speakers, there were more questions than could be answered. Still, several interesting topics were introduced, such as the role of feminism in global warming and the Bush administration’s motivations in “helping” the women of Afghanistan.

Demonstrating passion for empowering women worldwide, both DiFranco and Faludi answered questions with vigor and enthusiasm. Before anyone knew it, the two hours were up and the speakers were ushered off the stage to a standing ovation.

While in this day and age in which most people demand that their entertainment involve high-budget blockbuster movies or adrenaline-inducing activities, it was refreshing to see that people can still be captivated by intelligent discussion.

– Michelle Castillo

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