Interview: Yas Necati

Welcome to Feminist Create's first email interview with YAS NECATI!

So Yas, tell us a bit about your self and where you're from?

I’m a student, writer and feminist living in North London. I play guitar, and enjoy making fine art and writing poetry. I’m also writing a novel. I will complete it. I will.

How or where did you hear about the Feminist Create blog and what do you like about it?

I came across the blog whilst I was browsing my news feed on Facebook. It’s fantastic that there is a place for people to express themselves and share their passion and talents with others in such a cool space with a great format and awesome leadership.

Describe any creative work, projects, fun things you do.

Currently I’m working on a personal blog (http://yassayshi.blogspot.co.uk/) and also writing for an activist blog in America titled PBG (http://poweredbygirl.org/). On the side of those projects I post cute pictures of cats with feminist captions (http://feministcats.blogspot.co.uk/)! I’ve created two installations in the past year, and written lots of music and poetry! I’m hoping to finally finish the novel I’m writing about a very cool feminist with blue hair.

At the moment I’m organising a peaceful protest outside the News International headquarters addressing The Sun newspaper’s Page 3. We’ll be asking Dominic Mohan – very politely – to stop sexualising and objectifying women in Britain’s biggest-read family newspaper. Feel free to come along! The gathering’s on Saturday 6th July.

What inspired you to be a creative person?

I’ve always enjoyed writing and have been an aspiring novelist since the age of just 10! I’m also into journalism, but the quirky, activist-driven kind. I’m very inspired by recent writers like Laurie Penny and Caitlin Moran. It wasn’t until I was older that I got really into art. The contemporary fine artist Sarah Maple (http://www.sarahmaple.com/) heavily influenced a lot of my artwork. Not only did she inspire me to create drawings, paintings and photography to be thought provoking and controversial, but she also drew me into the feminist movement. Other influences include music and poetry. I’m a massive fan of Hollie McNish (http://holliemcnish.com/), Kate Tempest (http://katetempest.co.uk/) and Carol Ann Duffy. A lot of Madonna’s creative work, particularly her shows, is another of my influences. I love the music of Ani DiFranco, Ryan Amador and Dani Shay. Although I think the biggest thing that has driven my creativity is just activism in general. When I see things at home or school or work – or even just on the television or the street – that are upsetting and wrong, I think that that is the biggest provoker. There are a lot of personal stories from other people, but I have my own as well. Things that scream: “I need to be changed!” And those things are the ones that have inspired me to make music, and draw and write, because that really is the best way to get a message across and promote change. 

Is there something (or some things) that you find hard/difficult in order to continue to be creative?

Sometime’s I get writer’s block. That isn’t fun! I guess the biggest difficulty with being creative is making a living out of it. A lot of people discourage picking creative subjects to study because they see them as inferior to the academic ones. There’s so much competition to be a writer, artist or musician nowadays that a lot of people chose to only pursue it as a hobby. But then they get caught up with their job or something else, and there’s no time left to be creative because people have been absorbed into the rigidity of the system.

Can you talk about the cross over of being creative and being a Feminist for you or in your work/project/art?

Practically all of my artwork is based around feminism, (such as the installation above), and also a lot of my poetry. All of the blogs I write for/am involved in are largely feminist. Moreover the book I’m writing is like a modern feminist fairy-tale! So I guess there’s quite a big crossover between my creativity and the movement for equality. 

How important are specifically-feminist spaces in your life?

Very! It is extremely difficult to find other people, particularly of my age, who have even a vague interest in feminism. Specifically-feminist places are awesome! They allow people who think similarly to interact with one another and share their ideas in a place where they won’t be penalised, ignored or scoffed at.

Do you have a vision of, or an idea about, a more feminist-centred world?

Definitely, although it’s hard to explain in just a few sentences! At the moment women in the UK get paid 73p for every £1 a man earns in the same job. In a feminist-centred world there would be no pay gap. And women wouldn’t have to strip to become famous musicians, and actresses could have hairy underarms on the red carpet! And there would be an equal number of women to men in parliament, and abortion rights would be human rights and un-debatable. And female footballers wouldn’t be “women players” but just “players,” and there would be a female pope. And men would be able to dress a little less formally in the work-place like women always do, and fathers would get longer paternity leave. I think the most important thing about feminism is the emphasis on equality for everyone. You can’t have true equality if only women are liberated – in the few cases where men are oppressed, they need to be dealt with too. And I’m a strong believer that feminism is linked closely with other basic human rights. A more feminist-centred world would see women from all ethnicities and backgrounds being represented fairly in women’s magazines, and more gay comic-book characters! Ultimately, we’ll know we’ve reached equality when the words “cunt” and “pussy” are seen as empowering, just as it’s empowering to tell someone “You’ve got balls.”

Tell us something that you're really pleased about your self, in your life or creative work at the moment? (Show off or brag as much as you can or want! It's important that as creative Feminists we get to take up lots of space, especially on this blog, about stuff that we're totally excited about!!!)

I once posted a picture of my underarm hair on Facebook. At the time I thought it was the bravest thing I’d ever done! I got a lot of nasty comments, but also some really positive ones. I wanted to challenge the idea of the “hairless female” that is so widely adopted in modern culture. I still get people shouting “underarm hair” at me in the corridors today – but I think it’s great. It just proves that I had a point. That feminism still has a point.

If today you got to choose a person, living or dead, to positively influence the world and it's governments, who would you choose and why?

Ooh… this is a tough one! (Thinks in deep concentration for quite a few minutes) If I had to pick I guess I’d choose Rosa Parks. She was an extremely epic lady and I think she’d change everything and ask for no one’s permission.

Thanks so much for the interview!

Yas x