Sure she wears tu tu’s adorned with sequins and dyes her hair blue, but “California Girl” Katy Perry opened up to Rolling Stone about serious issues, like health care, in the cover story of this month’s issue. Backstage at her candy-coated ‘California Dreams Tour,’ Perry spoke candidly to the mag about everything from body image to politics.
The pop star, who spoke out last year about gay rights, boldly discussed her recent political epiphany regarding health care.
“It just feels like the thing running our country is a bank, money,” she said.
“I think we are largely in desperate need of revolutionary change in the way our mindset is. Our priority is fame, and people’s wellness is way low. I saw this knowing full well that I’m a part of the problem. I’m playing the game, though I am trying to reroute. Anyway, not to get all politically divulging and introspective, but the fact that America doesn’t have free health care drives me f*cking absolutely crazy, and is so wrong.”
The ‘I Kissed a Girl’ singer is a staunch supporter of gay rights, and was active in the “It Gets Better” initiative last year. The pop star said previously that her strict, religious upbringing did not influence her feelings about the LGBT community. “I am a gay activist and I say that proudly.”
Aside from politics, the stunning pop star discussed her body image insecurities, saying she didn’t always embrace her iconic curves.
“I started praying for [breasts] when I was, like, 11,” she said. “And God answered that prayer above and beyond, by, like, 100 times, until I was like, ‘Please, stop, God. I can’t see my feet anymore. Please stop!'”
The voluptuous adolescent was embarrassed by her body, an insecurity she later overcame as evidenced in her barely-there costume choices.
“I didn’t know I could use them,” she said. “So, what I did was, I started taping them down. How long did I tape them down for? Probably until I was about 19. And, no, I don’t have any psychological pain because of it.”
She may have been insecure about her bra size, but there’s one number Perry boasts proudly: her album sales. The pop star, who’s yet to win a Grammy Award and has received only mediocre critical reviews despite her astronomical commercial success, said the numbers outweigh anything else.
“Whenever people ask me about having bad reviews, I’m like, ‘Have you seen the run I’ve had? Have you see the numbers?'” she told the magazine. “Numbers do not lie!”
To date, Perry has sold a jaw-dropping 10,000,000 albums worldwide.
Although she has serious viewpoints, she knows her songs are better set for lounging poolside than inspiring a revolution.
“I’m not a dummy,” Perry said. “I know ‘California Gurls’ isn’t going to save the world. But I got a lot of heart from my upbringing and I put a lot of heart in my songs.”