Meryl Streep’s ‘I’d Rather Be A Rebel Than Slave’ Stance Slammed For Its ‘Racial Insensitivity’

Hollywood loves a slogan, but Meryl Streep’s enthusiastic adoption of Emmeline Pankhurst’s famous, “I’d rather be a rebel than a slave,” quote, to promote her new film “Suffragette,” has been slammed for its racial insensitivity.

How so? Well critics have argued that the Suffragette slogan, which has been used on t-shirts worn by Streep and her co-stars to promote the film, evokes unfortunate associations in regard to America’s history of slavery and the Confederate rebellion.

According to Time Out the quote worn on the T-shirts by Streep and her fellow thespians encapsulates the “idea of finding your voice, keeping your nerve and fighting the impulse to be a ‘good girl.'”

Not everyone agrees. Activist and organiser Deray McKesson tweeted that “Meryl Streep has to know better. And if not, her publicist should have.”

While Jamilah Lemieux refused to pull any punches and snarled somewhat viciously, with an unnecessary adjective thrown in for good measure, “White women have said a lot of terrible things over the course of history, doesn’t mean you wear it on a shirt.”

Pankhurst’s full quote from a 1913 speech reads, “I know that women, once convinced that they are doing what is right, that their rebellion is just, will go on, no matter what the difficulties, no matter what the dangers, so long as there is a woman alive to hold up the flag of rebellion. I would rather be a rebel than a slave.”

In isolation the quote is rather tame, if not inspiring, but no man or indeed woman is an island, and objectors to the turning of Pankhurst’s quote into a one size fits all slogan, argue that it appear to lump the plight of white woman at the beginning of the 20th century with the hell and horror endured by slaves.

After all, you can choose to be a rebel, but slavery is something which is forced upon you, usually with whips and shackles.

The Daily Mail reports that Critics have branded the campaign behind Streep’s new film as tone deaf, not just for the Confederacy connotations invoked when you pair the words, “slave” and “rebel,” but because of the uneasy history and tension which existed between the suffragettes and the black civil rights movement.

Some argue that some in the Suffragette movement attempted to exclude people of colour from their movement in case they damaged their chance to get a vote.

The film Suffragette also features an all-white cast, which has angered many who have accused it of a “white washing” of the women’s suffrage movement, which included more than just white women.

Prince once branded himself a “slave” when he was a multi-millionaire, topping the charts, living in a mansion and free as a very privileged bird. A few smiles were raised, eyelids battered, and jokes made, but no-one really took it seriously.

The Crystals once sang “He’s A Rebel,” but no-one had a pop at them for the glorification of Southern Gentlemen from a certain era who believed slavery was part of the natural order of things.

When the Suffragettes’ queen bee Emmeline Pankhurst made her famous speech, it’s doubtful if she was hoping it would offend users of social media over a century later, but c’est la vie. She was as she said, a rebel and not a slave to others who enjoy taking pride in their prejudice.

Yet we now live in a different age, where it appears the words “slave” and “rebel,” which have for centuries been as an universal expression of the human condition, cannot be used in another context outside of America’s troubled history to explain another human rights movement which made the world a far better place.

We’re not fighting for rights anymore, we’re fighting for our right to take offence.

(Image credit: Alex Wong/Getty Images/Twitter)