Clashing images of sexism and freedom make the music industry a confusing landscape for women.

This is the overriding theme five panelists and a moderator discussed in front of about 70 assembled music journalists, college and commercial DJs and record executives during the CMJ Music Marathon panel “Backlash: Is Frat Rock Killing Feminist Rock?”

“[Popular music] is not an easy place for women and yet it’s also the place where freedom supposedly lives in our culture,” said Ann Powers, panel moderator and New York Times senior pop music critic. “It’s the place we’re allowed to be sexual in what’s a fairly repressed America.”

Recently, hugely popular acts like Limp Bizkit and Eminem — “frat rock” — have been criticized for their misogynistic lyrics and attitudes. The panel said there seems to be a lack of strong women in pop music who can combat the sexist music that is selling millions of albums.

“All the cool chick rockers of the early ’90s have scurried back to the safety of the margins,” Sarah Jacobsen, filmmaker, said. “All you see now is Britney Spears.”

Except for a few artists such as Ani Difranco and Rah Digga, the current musical climate seems to lack a strong feminist element.

“We’re in this really strange place where it’s not really cool to be feminist right now,” Joan Morgan Murray, executive director of Essence magazine, said.

Looking back to rockers like Mick Jagger and the early days of hip-hop, the panelists said Bizkit and Eminem are not the first artists to bring these attitudes to the forefront of pop culture.

“I think hip-hop’s attitudes about women have been fairly consistent since day one,” Murray said. “Once the music hit vinyl and became marketable, tapping into the sexism of the larger culture became not only a mirror of what was going on in our community but also commercial and popular.”

And this marketable sexism has spread throughout rap and rock, easily noticeable in such recent hits as Sisqo’s “Thong Song” and Limp Bizkit’s “Break Stuff.”

“I think our culture’s at a point where everyone just wants to party and have a good time, and hip-hop is the hottest shit out there, it’s the coolest party,” Murray said. “And if that means you wear your skirt a little shorter, your heals a little higher, you’d rather be that girl, even if that’s not who you really are, than not be invited to the party.”

Images bombard consumers every day.

“I think people are being encouraged in some ways to think of themselves as objects, as consumers who themselves are consumable,” Powers said.

And record companies perpetuate this, using an artist’s visual presentation to sell more records and ancillary products. This means musicians usually need an image that will sell.

“[For women], the quickest route to getting a record deal is looking the right way,” musician Kinnie Starr said.

However, record companies are not the only ones who send this message to young women.

“You see fashion designers using super models with a guitar and their legs spread,” Starr said. “That’s fucked up, because young girls who are actually learning to play instruments are like, ‘I’m never going to get anywhere unless I put my eyeliner on in the morning.'”

Artists such as Lil’ Kim have capitalized on their marketable, sex-infused images.

“[Queen] Latifah was cool, but she never sold a million records — Lil’ Kim did.”

And some female musicians, such as Janet Jackson and TLC have shed their earlier feminism and independence portrayals for a more industry standard image.

“I used to look at them and think, ‘They’re the kind of people I’d want to hang out with,” Jacobsen said. “Now I think, ‘They’re the type of people that would steal my boyfriend.”

This statement brought up a point many of the panelists touched on as they spoke.

“It’s not just men that perpetuate these images,” Murray said.

The panelists agreed that women should be held partially accountable for the sexism that persists and thrives in popular music.

“When we have those conversations — ‘The rapper’s really sexist, the director’s really sexist” — what about those 101 hoochies that showed up in the video?” Murray said.

The panelists offered some advice to women who are aspiring musicians or who want to work in the music industry.

“People tend to treat you like you demand to be treated — that holds true in the music industry, too.”

The panelists challenged women and men to speak up against sexism in the industry. However, they weren’t all quite able to agree on their positions concerning “frat rock.”

“If you’re a lady and you like Limp Bizkit, don’t think, ‘Oh my God, I’m so weird, how could I like this?'” Powers said. “Or don’t think feminism is stupid because they, those feminists, they don’t know how to rock.

“There are things in Limp Bizkit that women connect to [and] there are things in Eminem that women connect to,” Powers added.

Jacobsen wasn’t quite as forgiving.

“If Fred Durst was here, I’d kick his ass,” she said. “Fuck Fred Durst.”