Lorde might be flawed, a work in progress who doesn’t do everything perfectly, but BFF Taylor Swift is totally cool with that. The singer told Lena Dunham in an interview for *Dazed's *Girls Rule the World issue: ‘She definitely brought me into this amazing world of supportive female friendship.’
‘For me, someone starts talking about boys and I’m like “I just don’t know what to say.” I’m useless in that capacity and that was why I thought, “Well, I can’t have girl friends (because) I don’t know how to talk about boys.”’
Of course that’s no obstacle for Taylor: ‘But Taylor just glosses over the fact that I’m terrible at that and she’s just like “It’s OK, I’ll love you for your other qualities.’
Lena replied: ‘I didn’t even have a boyfriend until three years ago. I was incapable of giving advice or having conversations about guys because of how alien my own experience was. My favourite thing in the world is talking to other women. You know this concept of the Bechdel Test?’
(FYI, the Bechdel Test is applied mostly to films – the film is considered better if there are at least two speaking female characters who speak to each other for more than two minutes about something other than men they have relationships with.)
Lorde then said: ‘Oh I do, yeah!’
Lena replied: ‘I like it when my friendships pass the Bechdel test. Like, it’s not just two women talking about boys, it’s two women talking about work, female friendship or current events. I love how rich and important that can be.’
It’s no wonder that Taylor and Lorde’s other mate, Ellie Goulding, recently said: ‘I find it so frustrating that female musicians are constantly defined by the men they have or haven’t dated. It’s something I’ve talked about with Taylor a lot. She definitely feels that. She gets bothered by it.’
So what did Lorde actually talk about if not boys?
Katniss:
‘I remember thinking how cool and natural it was to have someone like Katniss at the number one box office slot in America. A woman who is strong without even really thinking about it, it’s just who we are in this day and age.’
Mums:
‘She would encourage us to sit at the computer with her and type whatever it was we were thinking…even now, I can see patterns in my writing that were emerging when I was four or five years old, which is amazing.’
Feminism:
‘I’m not just going to do a 180 on a girl, because she hasn’t learned about feminism. I remember not being 100% sure what feminism or intersectional feminism is – I’m still not 100% sure! One thing I hadn’t come face-to-face with until I was about 16 was…all these questions around race and sexuality, which are incredibly important. For a long time, I wasn’t aware of how important it was to be a feminist for all women.’
That time she got into trouble for slagging off other singers (e.g. Selena Gomez):
‘I didn’t realise that some journalists were ensnaring me for the sake of a headline. Some things I don’t regret saying…but I don’t know, just some offhand comment about what I thought was funny about some teen pop sensation or whatever.’
She added: It’s an incredible privilege to have all these ears on you just quivering waiting for the next thing you have to say, so you might as well make that thing something awesome.’
Wise words there…
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.