Jenny Lindsay

Jenny Lindsay (born 1982) is a Scottish poet and spoken word performer.

Quotes

• Dangerous women are those who challenge the status quo, defy gender norms and stereotypes, often at personal risk, and who refuse to be charming just for an easy life. Now, as in the past, and across cultures, who is deemed a "dangerous" woman is generally decided by those who oppose them.
  • Question & Answer feature, as cited by Nadine McBay "Tea Break with...Jenny Lindsay", The National (5 November 2017)

• [On the emergence of the #MeToo movement since October 2017] Any institution worth its salt should have HR policies to deal with incidents like this. The problem with the arts is that you have a hell of a lot of freelancers, people working for themselves, you don't have a lot of people who you can go to and say "this has happened to me". The idea that this is all some kind of massive revelation is actually quite offensive. Because women have been talking about this for ages. And just because it was all en-masse and at once, everyone thought "Oh God".
• Nothing exists in isolation, we are talking about a systemic societal issue which is male violence against women, and within that, abuses of power, and hierarchies in the arts. As I have said about the 'not all men [are like that]' theme – I have yet to hear of a women boss forcing a male artist to masturbate: that just doesn’t happen. That just doesn't happen.
  • From an interview, as cited in "This Script: Jenny Lindsay, spoken word poet, on her new solo show which tackles feminism, pornography and #MeToo", The Herald (Glasgow, 27 January 2018)
  • In reference to the sexual abuse cases of former film producer Harvey Weinstein.

• I was also frustrated with what #MeToo and spoken word in general often demands from women, where you’re judged on your trauma, not your craft, your ideas.
• I knew I had to use spoken word to talk about various things I’d been speaking about in pubs, with women online who were all saying: "Oh my God. What the hell is happening to the world?"
  • From an interview with Nadine McBay, as cited in "Jenny Lindsay's This Script calls for finding solidarity in division", The National (3 August 2019)

• [On Lindsay's experience of being cancelled] My publisher was harassed. People who worked with me were harassed. Now, bear in mind, I'm not a public figure and all of this was kind of bubbling under the surface for about seven months.
  People trying to get me fired from things, my income tanking and me not really 100 per cent knowing why.
  And then it burst onto Twitter in February 2020, quite a febrile time just before a lockdown when a young poet I've never met called me a terf and tried to harass a small publisher to drop me from their programme.
  I retaliated of course, and then the Scottish Poetry Library got involved issuing a statement. opposing calls for no platforming, they fought against other poets, which led to almighty hell and the SPL accused of institutional transphobia and all of the time this has been reported in the papers with my name sort of attached to it, but people weren't 100% sure what I'd done, just that you got to avoid me now.
  • At a debate concerned with free speech organised by Reform Scotland, as cited in "Cherry says gender critical views have ruined SNP leadership hopes", The Herald (Glasgow, 9 May 2023)
  • The title refers to the then-MP Joanna Cherry. Lindsay was targeted in 2019 (and subsequently) for objecting to an article in The Skinny magazine which advocated "violent action" against gender-critical lesbians at a Pride march.