page_title: Joan Jett
section_title: Personal life
hierarchical_section_title: Joan Jett / Personal life
caption_attribution_description: Joan Jett in New York City's Union Square. Photographer's post about event.
context_page_description: Joan Jett is an American rock singer, songwriter, composer, musician, record producer and occasional actress. Jett is best known for her work as the frontwoman of her band Joan Jett & the Blackhearts, and for earlier founding and performing with the Runaways, which recorded and released the hit song "Cherry Bomb". The Blackhearts' version of the song "I Love Rock 'n Roll" was number-one on the Billboard Hot 100 for seven weeks in 1982. Jett's other notable hit songs include "Bad Reputation", "Crimson and Clover", "Do You Wanna Touch Me", "Light of Day", "I Hate Myself for Loving You" and "Dirty Deeds".
  Jett has a mezzo-soprano vocal range. She has three albums that have been certified Platinum or Gold, and has been a feminist icon throughout her career. She has been described as the Queen of Rock 'n' Roll and the Godmother of Punk. In 2015, Joan Jett & the Blackhearts were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
  Jett lives in Long Beach, New York, and has been a NY resident since the late 1970s.
context_section_description: Jett, after consistently refusing either to confirm or deny rumors that she is lesbian or bisexual, insinuated that she is indeed not straight. In a 1994 interview with Out magazine she said, "I'm not saying no, I'm not saying yes, I'm saying believe what you want. Assume away—go ahead." In 2006, she also addressed the rumors that she is an open lesbian by saying, "I never made any kind of statement about my personal life on any level. I never made any proclamations. So I don't know where people are getting that from."
  However, in a 2018 interview by the New York Times newspaper, when asked about the fact that a LGBT film festival didn't want to show her documentary because she didn't declare being lesbian or bisexual, she said "They don’t want the movie there because I don’t declare? [Holding up her necklace] What the [expletive] is that? Two labryses, or axes, crossing each other, inside of two women’s symbols crossing each other. It’s not been off since I got it. And I wear this one every day. [She turns around, lifts her shirt and reveals a tattoo with similar female symbols on her lower back.] I don’t know how much more you can declare."
  Jett supported Howard Dean in the 2004 election because of his opposition to the Iraq War.
caption: Jett promoting PETA in Union Square, New York City, 2010
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