Feminist author Bell Hooks calls Beyonce a 'terrorist'

theGRIO REPORT - Bell hooks, noted black feminist and author, recently went on a scathing tirade about Beyonce.

May 9, 2014

Bell Hooks, noted black feminist and author, recently went on a scathing tirade about Beyonce.

Hooks was on a panel at The New School called “Are You Still a Slave?” with authors Marci Blackman and Janet Mock and filmmaker Shola Lynch.

The evening began with Hooks voicing her opinion of Beyonce’s 100 Most Influential People Time magazine cover, showing her flaunting a sheer shirt and underwear.

“Let’s take the image of this super rich, very powerful Black female and let’s use it in the service of imperialist, white supremacist capitalist patriarchy because she probably had very little control over that cover — that image,” she said.

When it was time to discuss Beyonce’s song Partition, transgender activist Janet Mock talked about the song’s sexual expression saying that “it was freeing to have Beyoncé owning her body and claiming that space.”

In a response to Mock, Hooks made some scathing remarks:

“I see a part of Beyoncé that is in fact anti-feminist — that is a terrorist, especially in terms of the impact on young girls,” she said.

Now this is not the first time that Hooks had some choice words to say about Beyonce. In an interview with Kevin Powell at The BK-Nation, she discussed the performances of Beyonce’s “Drunk in Love” at the Grammys and the image of Jay-Z dressed in a suit while Beyonce wore a skin-revealing outfit, saying that “it is such an instance of primal patriarchal domination.”

Hooks later clarified her statement in another interview with The Feminist Wire, saying that she was only talking about the imagery of both performances of the song. “I was not responding to her use of the term ‘feminist’ as a personal descriptor,” she said.

Hooks went on to talk about the music video for Drunk in Love saying that she feels “her power and embodiment” when she is shown walking on the beach. But the Grammy performance to Hooks “is disruptive in its essentialist rendition of patriarchy, which makes her powerful embodiment no longer sexy nor as compelling as it was in the video.”

What are your thoughts on Bell Hooks’ statements on Beyonce? Tell us below.