Good morning, Broadsheet readers! Australian VCs reveal details about investing in women-led companies, A.I. is poised to disproportionately replace female workers, and Sinéad O'Connor refused to play by society's rules for women. Enjoy your Thursday!
- Rebel song. Sinéad O'Connor became a star in her 20s, rising to the top of the charts in the late 1980s and early 1990s with "Nothing Compares 2 U." Pop stars were—and are—expected to look and act a certain way. But O'Connor chafed at the constraints of mainstream success, shaving her head and protesting sexual abuse in the Catholic Church by tearing up a photo of the pope on Saturday Night Live.
The 1992 incident became a defining moment in the Irish star's career—and her life. “I feel that having a No. 1 record derailed my career,” she wrote in her 2021 memoir, “and my tearing the photo put me back on the right track.”
O'Connor has died at 56, her family confirmed yesterday. Beyond her music, she leaves another legacy: her refusal to play by society's rules for women.
As early as her first album, she declined to buy into cultural expectations. Her record label asked that she appear more "girly" before her album's release, the Washington Post writes in her obituary. She responded by shaving off her hair. (For more on this, I recommend Vanessa Friedman's New York Times piece about the significance of O'Connor's baldness as a refusal to cater to the male gaze and a determination of selfhood and identity.)
In her life and in her music, she was unafraid to display female anger. After that first buzz cut, O'Connor found mainstream success, dealt with international backlash, and retreated from the spotlight. The power of the forces she railed against has only become clearer since then—just look at the #FreeBritney movement.
“It seems to me that being a pop star is almost like being in a type of prison,” O'Connor told the New York Times in 2021. “You have to be a good girl.”
In recent years, O'Connor (who also went by Shuhada Sadaqat after converting to Islam) dealt with serious mental health challenges and the loss of her 17-year-old son last year.
Today, her legacy is all around. Women wear their baldness with pride. Celebrities become activists, without risking as much as O'Connor did when she took the SNL stage. "I wasn't acting like a pop star was supposed to act," O'Connor reflected in 2021. She showed the artists who followed her a different path.
Emma Hinchliffe
emma.hinchliffe@fortune.com
@_emmahinchliffe
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