Quotes by

Beth Ditto

My mother told me Homer Ditto was not my father. Nope. Mom had had a fling with some other guy who was my dad. Some dude who didnt stick around too long who Mom was happy to get rid of. She chose Homer, and Homer chose me, so he lent me his name even though I didnt have his blood. – Beth Ditto

For my group of friends is Lady Gaga eye-opening? No. Shes a less dangerous version of what was so cool about pop culture in the 80s. Back then it was so gay and so punk in so many ways. – Beth Ditto

All this fashion stuff – whos cool now – is just a bigger version of the cool kids versus the nerds. – Beth Ditto

I think its really cool that there are people like Adele on the cover of Vogue and Rolling Stone, and like I think its really important that people are talking about your body, because if they dont, then youll never be able to break that barrier. – Beth Ditto

I just like food too much, and I dont want to change. I spent so much of childhood trying to change, and I just got sick of it… I dont want to look like Britney Spears, I just dont want to. Shes hideous. – Beth Ditto

Girls are taught to sing high and pretty, like Antony, not low and from the guts like Nina Simone. But were slowly trying to change that. There are so many things were not told growing up, and its our true feminist responsibility to take the truth to the people who need to hear it. – Beth Ditto

I thought to be feminine was to give in to straight culture, or the beauty standard, but in my heart I had a flair for fashion and style. They were passions I kept secret because I didnt understand I could love clothes and hair and makeup and still like girls. – Beth Ditto

My size has helped make me an amazing performer too. The cliche of the Funny Fat Friend: I absolutely was that character – I am that character… Its a complicated bag of tools I acquired, and Ive put them all to work onstage. – Beth Ditto

A few years back, when my style was punk grandma, I picked up an amazing pair of sandals – orthopaedic ones, with really thick soles. Ive given them away to a friend now, because these days my look is more 1980s substitute teacher gone wild. – Beth Ditto

Starting out really punk came from not knowing any better and listening to music like that, not knowing how to play music – well, still not knowing how to play music. – Beth Ditto

I love sad songs. They say so much. I love country music but even the happy songs sound really sad. – Beth Ditto

Aretha Franklin was a teenage mom, a musician who came from an incredibly Christian background, but there was a lot of love, which is really inspiring in a feminist way. – Beth Ditto

I was brought up by a single mom in a poor town in Arkansas and while some aspects of small-town life were really positive – like the fact that everyone there is really sweet and hospitable – there is also this close-minded mentality, and that naturally made me want to rebel. – Beth Ditto

My dad liked to boil a squirrel head and suck the brains out the nose. Smaller than a chicken, bigger than a rat. – Beth Ditto