The Pitchfork People's List and the 12%

Or why men still really don't listen to female artists.

Or why so few women participated in the Pitchfork list in the first place.

Or why we're still talking about OK Computer.

As promised, Pitchfork published its readers' poll  this week; as expected, white boys with guitars dominated. Disappointingly, but again, not shocking if you've spent any time reading Pitchfork the past decade-and-a-half, of the nearly 30,000 readers who filled out a ballot, only 12% identified themselves as women.

Kelsey Wallace wrote a great piece for Bitch magazine  about the venerable site's lack of parity:

What this list does do, though, is underscore how heavily male the music industry still skews, especially when it comes to higher-minded "indie" fare. If we look at album sales during this same 15-year period, many more women top the charts, but since they're pop artists like Beyoncé, Britney Spears, and Carrie Underwood, they aren't considered when it comes to lists like this one.

In other words, "pop" stars like Britney and Beyoncé make music to move units, but they aren't making "art." It's an argument that most indie or rock fans wouldn't hesitate to support, and given the subjective nature of music, I'm not going to argue the artistic merits of one artist over another, but the problem is two-fold: men still aren't listening to women and women are being shut out of the kind of community music fandom has to offer.

Lindsay Zoladz, a contributing editor at Pitchfork, asked a few of her female friends  why they didn't make lists of their own. Writer Rachel Maddux also posted to her blog a number of reasons why she didn't participate. And as a women who has spent a lot of time in fan circles,  I can tell you, it's not always fun when you're constantly being "mainsplained." Of course including women solves only half the problem, and puts the onus on those women to make sure female artists are given the same respect as male artists.