Madonna’s Thatcher gaffe is a warning – quote at your peril

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/apr/21/madonna-thatcher-gaffe-rebelheart-instagram

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Anyone worried that pop stars have become too cautious, overprotected and media-trained to say anything interesting should be cheered up by the way that Madonna has entered social media like a drunk driver.

Her months-long joyride may have finally ended this week with a controversial Instagram post paying tribute to Margaret Thatcher. “If you set out to be liked, you would be prepared to compromise on anything at any time, and you would achieve nothing,” Madonna quoted, adding, “Thank you Margaret Thatcher! #unapolgetic [heart icon] #rebelheart.” (Rebel hearts obviously don’t use spellcheck.)

Related: Read this and feel better – how inspirational guff invaded our lives

Many people were less than delighted, especially those among Madonna’s loyal gay fanbase who pointed out Thatcher’s support for the infamously homophobic section 28 legislation. Madonna, who was not #unapolgetic after all, quickly deleted the post, implying that she hadn’t anticipated a backlash. So what was she playing at?

Madonna’s Thatcher gaffe makes more sense when you look at the #rebelheart hashtag in full. In January she caused a different kind of fuss by retweeting fan-made images which photoshopped the black rope that she wraps around her face on the cover of the Rebel Heart album on to portraits of Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King and Bob Marley. The captions were on the same level as a children’s book. Mandela fought for freedom, King had a dream, Marley sang One Love. Great lives reduced to slivers of inspiration.

The line from Thatcher can be found (and, I suspect, was found by Madonna) in numerous business books and online collections of “inspirational” quotes. In the inspirational-industrial complex, where quotes are usually unsourced and often misattributed, a useful sentiment has no history, no context, no consequences. It’s just about believing in yourself and getting things done.

Two years ago Pinterest user Emily Pattinson spoofed this trend by juxtaposing pictures of Taylor Swift with uncredited aphorisms from Stalin, Bin Laden and Hitler, and hardly anyone noticed. The Lifehacker website followed up with a list of 10 Surprisingly Inspirational Quotes from Evil People, featuring uplifting can-do advice from the likes of Charles Manson and Attila the Hun. Dictators and cult leaders are, after all, notoriously good at following their dreams and shrugging off (ie killing) the haters.

I’m not sure Madonna has ever heard of section 28, or the miners’ strike, or Thatcher’s description of fellow #rebelheart Nelson Mandela as a terrorist, or any of the dire consequences of her distaste for compromise. The quote exists in splendid isolation. As a leftwing British citizen who grew up in the 1980s I’m instinctively loth to acknowledge any of Thatcher’s virtues. It feels too much like the old line about Mussolini making the trains run on time. But perhaps for Madonna, who didn’t live in Britain until the Blair years, it is enough that Thatcher was a determined woman with firm convictions who outwitted the sexist establishment and exceeded expectations. Much like a certain singer from Detroit.

Madonna only been doing what people do every day on Facebook: turning historical figures into cheerful quote machines

In that sense Madonna is Thatcheresque but, not being familiar with her views on monetarism or privatisation, I’d hesitate to call her Thatcherite. On the cover of 2003’s American Life she posed as Che Guevara but that didn’t make her a Marxist.

What’s interesting about the #rebelheart fiasco is how Madonna’s habit of using political figures for apolitical ends has slammed into the wall of people who actually know their history. But really she has only been doing what people do every day on Facebook or at business seminars: turning major historical figures, with all their strengths, flaws and contradictions, into cheerful quote machines; regarding the past as simply a stockpile of useful advice for the present.

If this silly incident achieves anything, it could be to deter pop stars from comparing themselves to people they know too little about. As Taylor Swift so wisely said: “Do not compare yourself to others. If you do so, you are insulting yourself.”

No, wait, sorry, that was Hitler.