Students at West’s new Zine issues

Combining music, feminism, politics and punk subculture, zines are a form of activim and self expression. The DIY-style magazines were popularized by the riot grrrl movement in the late 80’s and 90’s. Zines talk about the LGBTQ+ community, mental health awarness, feminism, sexuality, religion, and personal memoirs. Zines are making a comeback and many Gen Z are contributing. Multiple people from West are expressing themselves and showing multiple forms of feminism through Zines including sopohmore Al Robles and junior Miranda Lawley.

     Junior Miranda Lawley includes many other people in her zines through their artwork, poems, and personal memoirs. In her zines, her own stories and art are presented too. She has produced two issues of her zine “Poster Child”  and has a third coming soon,  for a price. Lawley discovered zines through the web, where most people find their interests. Meeting people online helped her discover her love for zines and inspired her to start making them herself. 

     Sophomore Al Roble’s zines “The Suffragetes” has 3 issues so far and include topics such as feminism, punk-rock band and playlists, and artwork made by them and other people they know.  Al started getting into Zines through the internet and others they knew. Feminist topics in the zines include talk about womens rights and the imbalance of power between men and women. “I make the playlists to show people real music, most people don’t listen to music and hate it, I don’t know why, so I want to spread good music out to people,” Al said.

      A lot of zines contain music from the 90’s and 80’s era with the genres containing punk rock, extreme metal, folk music, and pop.

     “I’m really interested in the old fashion style of dresses and hats and makeup and such, I think it’s cute and just fascinating, I make a lot myself, and I want people to share that same interest and show them that bit of history”.