April 11, 2024 • 39 mins
Today, we bid farewell to an archetype that defined millennial hustle culture: the #girlboss. Danielle and Simone give heartfelt eulogies, and are joined by cultural critic Leigh Stein to understand the girlboss rise and fall. Leigh helps make sense of why it’s time to let her go, and where we go from here. Plus, we dive into AI therapy (yes, it’s real), the new Bridget Jones movie, and the paradigm-shifting viewership of the women’s NCAA Finals. Send in your #girlboss condolences: hello@thebrightsidepodcast.com.
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Hello Sunshine.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
Hey besties. Today on the bright side, we're paying our
respects to a concept that has weighed heavily on us,
The Girl Boss. May she rest in peace. Author and
cultural critic Lee Stein joins us to talk about the
rise and eventual downfall of the Girl Boss, and we
look ahead to the future of women in the workplace.
Speaker 3 (00:22):
I think Girl Boss the movement became synonymous with millennial
hustle culture, and I think one of the things that
would come to harm the Girl Boss in the end
was that we had the idea that if the girl
slash woman was running the company, it would be different
than when the boys ran the company.
Speaker 4 (00:39):
It's Thursday, April eleventh.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
I'm Danielle Robe.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
And I'm Simone Voice, and this is the bright side
from Hello Sunshine. Okay, so today we're trying something a
little bit new, and I'll tell you why. So I've
been feeling for a long time that we need to
properly memorialize the Girl Boss because she is an icon,
a legend, but she was ever present if you were
(01:05):
a millennial working woman between twenty fourteen to let's say
twenty twenty.
Speaker 4 (01:10):
Right, Yeah, So I think that we're going to get
into what the Girl Boss is was how it impacted
our lives in society. But I really want to hear
about how the Girl Boss impacted you personally. First were
you did you feel connected to her?
Speaker 1 (01:26):
Simone?
Speaker 2 (01:27):
I felt so connected to the Girl Boss. I mean
I was hashtagging hustle quotes on Instagram, Danielle, I was
rocking the pants suits. I mean, I probably had girl
Boss merch. It just made me feel like I was
a part of something, like I was linked to all
the other ambitious young women in my age who were climbing,
who were building. I mean I was in New York
(01:48):
City at the time whenever the Girl Boss really exploded.
So it just felt like this movement that I wanted
to be a part of. And then of course it
all came crashing down and I have a very complex
relationship with it. Now, what do you think of when
you think of the Girl Boss.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
I think of the esthetic so much.
Speaker 4 (02:05):
I think of the millennial pink and the twelve different
textures of millennial pink.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
And I think of Beyonce.
Speaker 4 (02:15):
Because there was that quote that was going around the
internet that said, you have the same amount of hours
in the day as Beyonce, and I think that idea
exemplified the Girl Boss so well, which was like hustle hard,
do the most, don't sleep, and it was all kind
of unrealistic.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
But I think that.
Speaker 4 (02:36):
The Girl Boss, for all of her wrongdoings, actually set
us up for a better place at work and in
work culture for women as a whole. And so I'm
really excited to unpack all of it with you.
Speaker 2 (02:50):
We have decided that we need to have a proper
memorial for the Girl Boss. I need some closure. I
wonder if some of our right side besties might be
fit from some closure too, So we're gonna be laying
her to rest with an expert and also a couple
of eulogies from yours.
Speaker 4 (03:07):
Truly, I think may can we call it a funeral?
I think we're having a funeral for the Girl Boss.
We are May she rest in peace.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
But first, here's what's popping on our feeds today. This
is your morning drip, y'all.
Speaker 4 (03:20):
Okay, we got to kick it off with a huge
win for women in sports because for the first time ever,
more people watch the women's NCAA championship game than the
men's game.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
We need a.
Speaker 4 (03:33):
Sound effect we need a blowhorn.
Speaker 2 (03:37):
Did you just do that with your mouth?
Speaker 1 (03:39):
Yeah? Yeah, that was incredible. You're so talented.
Speaker 4 (03:42):
I'm so excited by this because it wasn't just by
a little, it was by a lot. According to Nielsen,
which is like the ratings for television, eighteen point nine
million viewers tuned in to watch South Carolina take on
Iowa Sunday afternoon, which was the women's game, compared to
fourteen point eight million people who watch the men's championship
(04:03):
Monday night. So I'm not an expert in math, but
that's like a four million person difference.
Speaker 2 (04:07):
I think I think you're great at math, because you're
absolutely right. I mean, we are living in history right now.
This is so cool.
Speaker 4 (04:16):
Also, everybody was talking about how the women's college basketball
games were way more fun to watch this year than
the men's, and.
Speaker 1 (04:23):
That's for a lot of reasons. Like part of it is.
Speaker 4 (04:25):
That a lot of the men are going to play
pro earlier, and so it feels kind of like B
League to watch the men's right now. And the women
are just so dominant, and I'm excited to see some
of the stars that come out of the women's basketball
movement and moment right now, I.
Speaker 2 (04:43):
Think you're absolutely right. Okay, taking a hard left turn here, Danielle.
I know you're a fan. You said your favorite movie
is First Wives Club?
Speaker 4 (04:52):
Right, Oh yeah, I will watch any rom com thirty
times over.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
Okay, So, Bridget Jones, where do you stand on that
huge see? I watched them all on airplanes all the time.
Did you watch Bridget Jones? I did. Such fond memories
and more good memories are coming because she is back.
Speaker 3 (05:09):
Y'all.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
We've just learned that Renees Elwiger, Emma Thompson, and Hugh
Grant are going to reprise their roles for a fourth
Bridget Jones movie, and it's going to be called Bridget
Jones Mad About the Boy.
Speaker 4 (05:22):
We have to say that in a British accent. Mad
about the Boy.
Speaker 2 (05:25):
Mad about the Boy airs just better, not great, not
my best work. So this is actually based on the
book of the same name that came out in twenty thirteen.
This story is going to follow newly widowed Bridget as
she navigates dating as a fifty one year old single mom. Now,
of course, there are going to be some crazy hijinks,
like cooking up with a much younger man can't wait
(05:46):
to see that. I'm also curious, Danielle, to see how
they adapt this story for modern times, because it's been
a minute since we had a Bridget Jones installment.
Speaker 4 (05:55):
Yeah, and if you remember, I mean, it's ever present
on the internet. But there's a lot of parts of
this movie that worked twenty years ago that don't feel
okay in current day. One of them being I remember
when this came out, everybody was like, I can't believe
they put a plus size woman at the front and
center of a movie, and it was like she weighed
(06:16):
one hundred and thirty six pounds and was a size twelve.
So like, none of that works today, thank god, but
I do. One of the things I love about Bridget
Jones and the whole story is that she never lived
by a timeline.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
I think she has a baby at forty three.
Speaker 4 (06:33):
We see her go through life moments so candidly and
sometimes she stumbles, which I love because, especially in that
era of film, everything was about women being so perfect,
and here she was being so imperfect and so lovable.
So I am really excited for this reboot.
Speaker 2 (06:51):
I totally agree, and I think what's really cool about
this is number one, we're getting to see a portrayal
of a fifty one year old single mom, which we
don't get to see that often. But also, Renees Elwiger
is fifty four years old, and we don't often get
to see women who are her age in Hollywood getting
roles like this because they're so often erased and invisible.
So I love this for her. Nobody could have played
(07:13):
this role other than Renee, Like, she just embodies this
character so beautifully at this point, So I think it'll
be fun to see her in the modern world, Like
is she going to have a Tinder account? There's so
many ways that this could unfold.
Speaker 4 (07:26):
One thing I know for sure is she's going to
remain a clumsy, relatable queen.
Speaker 2 (07:31):
Yes, And we love a clumsy relatable queen, don't we.
Speaker 1 (07:35):
Yes, we do.
Speaker 4 (07:36):
As a girl who trips up the stairs all the time,
I appreciate clumsiness being portrayed on film.
Speaker 2 (07:41):
So maybe one of the things that Bridget Jones is
going to do, maybe she'll go to a therapist. Who knows,
we'll see.
Speaker 1 (07:47):
I would love that, big fan.
Speaker 2 (07:49):
That would be very relatable. And that reminds me of
an article that I came across this is crazy. So
AI is now making its way into mental health apps
and therapy. We are going yea start seeing AI as
a part of therapy. I mean, as a huge advocate
for therapy, I think any way that we can make
it more accessible is great. But I don't know about this.
(08:11):
This makes me kind of nervous.
Speaker 4 (08:14):
I think there's a lot of pros and cons here.
One of the things that does make me nervous simone
is that there's a lot of room for error, right
Like AI therapy and AI in general is only as
good as what it's exposed to, and so there's potentially
erroneous information via its creator that can come through. There's obviously,
(08:34):
like privacy and ethical concerns. I think my personal concern
is that it's impersonal treatment, like how is it actually
going to give proper feedback. The bright side I see
here is that a lot of times, when people, including myself,
are in pain, you just want a little connection, and
(08:56):
if you don't feel comfortable going to somebody you know,
or you don't have somebody at that moment, it's really
nice to know that there's just something there to talk to.
I just hope that the tech is good enough that
the responses back are ethical.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
I don't know. I don't know about this one. I
don't think I'm an AI therapy fan. Why does everything
have to be technology? Like, can't we just what's wrong
with regular therapy?
Speaker 1 (09:21):
Well, actually they're saying that right now.
Speaker 4 (09:25):
It's best used as a companion to in person therapy.
So your instincts are on the right track. Is this
something that you would try out?
Speaker 2 (09:35):
Gosh, that's a really good question. I don't know that
I would try this out at this point in my life,
but I can definitely remember being younger and not having
enough money to see a therapist, or having to get
over that emotional mental hurdle of like, Okay, I need therapy.
I need to go see someone, and perhaps AI could
(09:56):
help reduce that barrier to entry for a lot of people.
Speaker 4 (10:00):
Yeah, I think that's the consensus online too. I feel
nervous typing such personal information into a technological anything. It
feels like uploading your medical records or something. But I
think if you're really in pain and you need some connection,
it's not a horrible place to start.
Speaker 1 (10:21):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
I just don't know, folks, all.
Speaker 4 (10:25):
Right, I think our consensus is that We need a
little bit more information on this, but we're going to
keep an eye on it, and we're going to take
a quick break. But up next we'll be back with
writer and culture critic Lee Stein on the life and
death of the girl Boss. All right, we're back, and
(10:50):
today on the show, we're talking about the rise and
the fall of the girl Boss.
Speaker 2 (10:56):
Ooof this is a big one.
Speaker 1 (10:57):
Well, she was born in the mid twenty tens.
Speaker 4 (11:00):
She was simultaneously a power fantasy and a utopian promise.
Speaker 2 (11:04):
Oh I love that.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
I was almost tricked by her.
Speaker 4 (11:06):
The girl boss was an archetype of a successful woman.
She was confident, she was capable, and man, oman did
she love to work. And then we all discovered that
the girl boss could behave just as badly as the
boy bosses. And just as quickly as she rose to superstardom,
she started to fall.
Speaker 2 (11:23):
She crumbled, She grumbled real good. And then as recently
as this spring, Sofia Amaruso, who's the founder of Nascial
and the person who coined the term girl boss, she agreed,
it's time to put this phrase to bed. See you later,
see a later girl Boss. That's exactly what we're doing.
So here to help us eulogize the girl Boss and
(11:44):
forecast the future of work is cultural critic, writer, and,
according to Vox, the world's foremost authority on the girl Boss,
Lee Stein. Welcome, Lee, thank you.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
Okay.
Speaker 4 (11:55):
Today we're talking about the demise of the girl Boss.
But to really understand and her downfall, I think we
have to go all the way back to the beginning.
Where did the girl Boss come from?
Speaker 2 (12:06):
Lee?
Speaker 3 (12:06):
So I think it's important to understand that the girl
Boss rose in the wake of Cheryl Sandberg's famous self
help book lean In. So Cheryl Sandberg is a gen
xer and she publishes this book lean In, that becomes
this blockbuster's bestseller. That's telling other gen X women to
kind of lean in in the corporate workplace so that
they can climb the ladder and get to the c suite.
(12:28):
And then the millennial girl boss comes in and she's like,
I don't want to climb the ladder, Like I want
to disrupt this whole thing. So someone like Audrey Gellman,
who is the founder of the Wing, they come in
as disruptors, they're CEOs, and the media starts using this
word girl boss to describe them. And the word girl
boss comes from another one of these women named Sophia Amaruso,
(12:50):
who was the founder of a company called Nasty Gau,
which was kind of a fast fashion retailer, and she
wrote a memoir called hashtag girl boss, and I think
from the beginning she was using it kind of tongue
in cheek, but she coined the term and then it
started being applied to all these millennial late twenties, early
thirty somethingter female founders.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
Lee for anyone out there who doesn't know, can you
explain what is the Wing and what is nasty Gal.
Speaker 3 (13:14):
The Wing was a co working space for women that
started in New York City and it ended up spreading
to multiple locations throughout the country. But the idea was
if you were a working girl in the city and
you needed a place to send an email from your
laptop or freshen up for an event that night, you
could get a membership at the Wing. Nasty Gal was
(13:35):
started by Sophia Amarusso. She started actually selling vintage fashion
just on eBay and her business grew into this fast
fashion retailer. Within six years, her business was making one
hundred million dollars and the new York Times called her
the Cinderella of Tech.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
I'm bringing a lot of baggage to this conversation. Lee.
You don't know me, but this is a heavy one
for me because the Girl Boss sank her pretty pink
talons into me and she did not let go for
many years. And I'll tell you why. So twenty fourteen
that was kind of peak girl Boss era. I was
in my mid twenties and it was a year of
(14:13):
career first for me. I had gotten my first six
figure job as a journalist, it was my first time
living in New York City, my first dream job, and
the girl Boss it was more than just a term
to me. At that time. I was surrounded by other
high achieving, ambitious women. It felt like we were all
rising together. So that term it became this rallying cry.
(14:38):
Can you talk about that a little bit more? Because
there was this community and movement that really formed around it. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (14:44):
So I think girl Boss the movement became synonymous with
millennial hustle culture. It was work around the clock, go
for your goals. And I think one of the things
that would come to harm the Girl Boss in the
end was that we had the idea that if the
girl slash woman was running the company, it would be
different than when the boys ran the company. So we thought,
(15:07):
women help each other out, sisters help sisters. The reason
that there's all these toxic workplaces is because none of
them are run by women. If we put women in charge,
going to work will be like a utopia for everyone.
And you looked at the Instagram accounts or the websites
of these brands, and this is where the term millennial
pink is also starting to come into play. It looks soft,
(15:27):
it looks like a velvet couch, it looks like unlimited cappuccinos.
It just looks like a feminine utopia. But in fact,
as we would come to learn, women can behave badly
as much as men can behave badly. And if you
have VC funding, your imperative is to scale at any cost,
(15:48):
just like the startups founded by men. And so the
scaling mentalities started to clash with this kind of feminist,
well intentioned intention to do better for girls and women.
Speaker 4 (16:04):
Part of what I think makes the concept of girl
boss really complicated is that it essentially combined feminism with capitalism.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
Absolutely.
Speaker 4 (16:13):
What was the danger in combining these two well, I
think it set women up to fail because we didn't
say to Adam Newman at we work, like Adam Newman,
you have to be you have to be.
Speaker 3 (16:24):
The president and the founder of this company. But we
said to women like Audrey Gellman that her project was
not only capitalistic, but her project was also a form
of social justice with her goals at the Wing, And
so you're exactly right that they combined feminism and capitalism.
It was this kind of new experiment. And when I'm
looking back in hindsight at the Wing, which fell in
(16:46):
twenty twenty, she only had like.
Speaker 1 (16:48):
Three years to pull it off.
Speaker 3 (16:49):
I'm glad to use the word complicated, because I think
we can hold these women accountable for the things they
did wrong. But I don't think they're given as many
chances and opportunities to fail as the boy Boss's.
Speaker 4 (17:00):
Get There's a quote in your article that I think
drives this home. You say, the problem with making Girl
Boss feminism as a part of your brand in order
to appeal to customers was that those customers were going
to expect you to put your values into practice.
Speaker 3 (17:15):
Yeah, and I think there was a lot of criticism
of kind of the optics of Girl boss feminism. There
was a mismatch between what was presented publicly and what
was actually happening in this workplaces behind the scenes. A
lot of female founders faced criticism for their workplace environments,
including Sofia Amrusso herself. At Nasty Gal. She was actually
(17:36):
sued by several employees who said they were wrongfully terminated
for being pregnant, and that lawsuit was settled and Sofia
Amroso actually stepped down after that. Another thing that I
find interesting is how many of these girl bosses fell
in twenty twenty and were kind of publicly disgraced and
they kind of withdrew and scaled back instead of doing
(17:58):
what Adam Numan did and going big on their move.
So Audrey Gellman ended up opening a small shop. Leandre
Medine Cohen, who ran the brand Man Repeller, she closed
Man Repeller and just started a Substack newsletter. So it
makes me wonder and think about the future. You know,
It's like these women had big, bold ambitions, and where
(18:18):
does that ambition go if in the public spotlight?
Speaker 1 (18:21):
We love you and then we love to hate you.
Speaker 2 (18:24):
I want to talk about the future in just a
little bit, but before we do that. I want to
circle back to kind of the etymology of all this,
because I think how we talk about female ambition says
a lot about how we think about femininity and power.
Why do we think that we need these pop feminist
labels for things like female ambition? So do you think
(18:45):
that ideas like the girl Boss are an effort to
sanitize power because it feels like a dirty word for women.
Speaker 3 (18:52):
It's such an interesting question. I think it's important to
note that Sophia Amroso does not identify as a feminist. So, Sophia,
I'm so with Girl Boss. She's coming out as a
capitalist full stop. And where it gets tricky is when
you combine capitalism and feminism. There is this interesting trend
that I'm seeing on TikTok now where everything girly is glamorized.
(19:14):
So it's like girl walk, girl dinner, And I'm noticing
that women, adult women kind of glamorize or miss girlhood. Yeah,
And it also makes me think if that's a response
to Girl Boss, if it's like I don't want to hustle,
I want to wear bows in my hair like I
want to girl rest, it.
Speaker 2 (19:34):
Really does seem like the rise of girlhood is a
response to the harshness of the girl boss era. I mean,
so much of the girl boss movement was about suppressing
and shaming a certain kind of femininity in order to
assimilate into a male dominated workplace.
Speaker 4 (19:48):
I do also want to talk about that etymology. So
when things are labeled like man, bun or guyliner, it
means it's default female. But the girl boss was default male.
What do you think that meant?
Speaker 3 (20:03):
I think because of women's history, when we think of
success and power, we look at men and then we
plug a woman in. So we look at male suits
in the eighties and we give women's shoulder pads. It's
like just switching out one thing for another. And so
women can try to learn to act like men, they
(20:23):
can learn to act more masculine in a workplace environment,
but then they're seen as all these negative stereotypes that
they wouldn't want to be. So they're constantly trying to
navigate in between these complexities of being powerful but likable,
strong but not aggressive. And I think the girl boss
slides right in there because these millennial girl bosses were
all very beautiful women. They're very photogenic. You could put
(20:46):
them on the cover of a magazine, So they aren't
threatening in that way. They were likable, pleasing to the eye.
But they were also powerful and strong and wealthy and successful,
and so it's like they somehow they managed to tick
every single box for like five minutes before we decided
that they failed, and then we knocked them off the pedestal.
Speaker 4 (21:08):
Okay, Lee, talk to us about the Girl Boss's downfall.
What year did it all start to crumble?
Speaker 3 (21:14):
So it was crumbling in twenty nineteen and twenty twenty.
There was a big story in Verge at the end
of twenty nineteen about Steph Corey and Jen Rubio, who
were the founders of a Way Luggage, And this expose
was about this like toxic work culture, employees working around
the clock to get this luggage shipped in time for
the holiday, and this caused a huge scandal. Everyone talked
(21:37):
about it on the internet. I think it is interesting
to take a step back and contrast that with the
work culture at let's say like Twitter under Elon Musk,
and you can see people saying, oh, Elon, he's such
a complicated figure. Just the language that we use to
describe male founders compared to the way we describe female founders.
Then it got worse in twenty twenty in the pandemic
(21:57):
when we were all at home and we were two
on line. And to this day, anytime there's news about
any of these women, the cut writes a story about it,
because for some reason, we can't get enough of these stories.
What are these women doing now? We're obsessed as if
we just want them to shut up and go away?
But is that what we want? We want them to
just stop starting businesses. I don't think that that's a
(22:19):
good example either.
Speaker 1 (22:22):
We do this in pop culture. I've been seeing it
a lot with Jlo.
Speaker 4 (22:25):
Recently, there was a TikTok of a woman saying I
can't believe she paid twenty million dollars to end her
own career because people are like, it's too much, Jlo,
She's putting too much out there. Go away, And I'm thinking,
we don't say that about any male celebrity.
Speaker 3 (22:41):
We all work in a competitive industry. We work in
the media industry. I work in book publishing. We're looking
at our peers, we're looking at our friends, We're seeing
who got what. We're ambitious women, We're driven, and so
not everyone can win every prize, and so I think
watching these women fall, there's almost like a thrill in it.
To me, it becomes almost like a spectator sport totally.
(23:02):
The summer of twenty twenty, this was like our sports
game that we were watching on the internet.
Speaker 2 (23:07):
I mean, I think, in the most simple terms, it's
just misogyny. It's just the fact that there are a
lot of people still today who feel like women don't
deserve to be in any of these positions, and so
they are so eager to see them removed from them.
Speaker 1 (23:21):
Toille's point, I think women do it to other women also.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
It's true, but it's totally true. But that can that's
internalized misogyny. I mean, we see that so much.
Speaker 3 (23:29):
I don't think it's internal I wouldn't define it that
way myself. I think men know how to be physically
aggressive with one another. A man can meet another guy
outside the bar and beat his nozen. Women know how
to be socially aggressive with one another, and women know
how to destroy each other's reputations and damage each other socially.
They know how to hurt someone's feelings, and so this
(23:50):
kind of pile on with the girl bosses. I think
it's really women doing it to each other.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
So do you think that that is innate behavior or
is that something that women and have learned from observing
men in the workplace.
Speaker 3 (24:02):
No, I think women are socialized to do it to
one another because they're competing for the one guy, you know,
to be reductive and simple about it. But I think
women learn how to do this at school. I mean
they learn how to be cliquish.
Speaker 2 (24:12):
Yeah, So, Lee, I want to talk about where do
we go from here in this post girl Boss world?
Like I mentioned, the girl Boss made me feel like
I was a part of something, and I think there
are other millennial women who feel that way too. So
is there a new community that offers that today.
Speaker 3 (24:31):
I was thinking about this, and I'm glad you asked
about the word community because I was looking to kind
of compare and contrast a younger founder with the with
the millennial girl Boss. And I found this artifact from
twenty fourteen when Emily Weiss launched Glossier. The blog post
that she wrote, she said, We're laying the foundation for
(24:51):
a beauty movement, one that celebrates real girls in real life.
It has this very like aspirational empowerment toned to it.
And then I compared this with the description of Hailey
Bieber's beauty brand Road, and so she says, Road is
dedicated to making products based in science and great formulation,
simplifying many of the mysteries and complex narratives behind efficacious skincare.
(25:17):
It's so clinical and cold, like it sounds scientific, it
sounds smart, but it's not saying like girls were all
in this together. It's saying like, do you want an
effective product that works, That's why you should buy my brand.
So I'm not seeing the same kind of like we're
doing it for the sisterhood kind of branding that was
so popular among the millennial girl bosses. Another example that
(25:37):
we could talk about is Emma Chamberlain. I think of
like Emma Chamberlain as kind of a gen Z superstar
and an entrepreneur, and she started Chamberlain Coffee, but it's
still all her brand. Like she's not coming in and
saying I'm going to disrupt Starbucks. She's just saying, here's
my own coffee brand because I care about coffee, and
(25:59):
her face is all over. So I'm wondering if gen
Z is really going to be more about the personal
brand and less about scaling and disrupting the way millennials were.
Speaker 4 (26:08):
That's an interesting point, Yeah, because there is this part
of girl Boss that is the opposition. It's the disruption,
and so I do agree with you. I think that
that the personal brand is more interesting than saying I'm
going to do this totally different.
Speaker 2 (26:24):
I think that aligns with what we're hearing about younger generations,
that they have declining trust in institutions and they're more
likely to trust a personal brand.
Speaker 3 (26:34):
I think that's such a smart point. I think we
were already feeling this kind of distrust in institutions, like
we had distrust in politicians. But around the girl Boss era,
it was like, well, maybe we could trust this company
that's trying to do things differently. Maybe we could put
our trust in Everlaine. Right, maybe Everlaine will save us.
But maybe the younger generation is saying, maybe I can
only trust this personal brand. Who I think I know.
(26:57):
I think I know I'm a Chamberlain because I watch
her on YouTube. I feel like I know her. They're
in a personal, parasocial relationship with each creator or entrepreneur.
Speaker 4 (27:06):
I think that girl Boss walked so that we could
run I do feel a type of sort of disgust
if I'm being honest with the girl Boss movement, and
yet I'm so grateful to it because I do feel
like they open doors for people like Emma Chamberlain or
an every day entrepreneur, regardless of how big or small
your company is, to do it in a way that's
(27:28):
not so grand and performative.
Speaker 3 (27:32):
Something I learned is that it's always easier to criticize
than it is to build something. So it's very easy
to go on social media and knock someone down and
criticize what they've done. It takes a lot more energy
and hope and strength to create or build, and so
just to build on what you said, Danielle, like creating
or building. It doesn't have to be at scale. It
(27:53):
can start small. But I think the women that continue
to launch, create, try run expai That's what gets me excited.
That's what I try to do in my own work.
It's just like, keep creating and keep building.
Speaker 2 (28:05):
The girl Boss may be dead, but feminine ambition is
still alive and well so. According to McKinsey, women are
actually more ambitious now than before the pandemic. Quote, nine
to ten women ages thirty and under want to be
promoted to the next level, and three and four aspired
to become senior leaders. So maybe we've held on to
(28:25):
some of that ambition from the Girl Boss era.
Speaker 1 (28:27):
I think we have.
Speaker 3 (28:28):
It's still so new, like female leadership in corporate America.
We've only been doing it like the last forty fifty years.
Like there's so much further that we can go, we
just need more time to try it.
Speaker 2 (28:40):
Lee, this has been really insightful having you here. Thank
you so much. Thank you.
Speaker 3 (28:45):
I'm always happy to talk about the girl Bob.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
Lee Stein is a writer and cultural critic. For more
from the brilliant mind of Lee, check out her novels
Self Care and Land of Enchantment.
Speaker 4 (29:00):
Taking a Quick Break and then The bright Side continues
our celebration of life for the dearly departed Girl Boss.
Speaker 2 (29:17):
Before we close out the show, we both have a
few parting words that we'd like to share about The
Girl Boss are eulogies. If you will, Danielle, would you
like to go first?
Speaker 1 (29:31):
I'll start.
Speaker 4 (29:34):
Hello all, I'm Danielle Robe And while I didn't know
the Girl Boss all that well, mostly because I'm a
sleepy girl who was never willing to forego rest hours
for a powder, pink anything. As a millennial woman, I
felt like I should say a few words. The girl
boss was the epitome of empowerment, the queen of hustle,
(29:55):
the CEO of her own destiny. But she wasn't just
sipping coffe for fuel. She was gulping down tears of
her interns and calling it motivation. As we bid farewell
to the era of hashtag girl boss, we reflect on
the highs and lows of a movement that empowered women
to lean in, speak up, and hustle hard, all while
(30:19):
wearing killer heels, doing power poses, and conquering the world
one inspirational quote at a time. As we lay her
to rest, so too, dies hashtags in general, but specifically
ones like hashtag boss babe, hashtag hustle, hashtag women in Business,
and hashtag team no Sleep. We bid ad to the
(30:43):
perfectly curated Instagram feed with perfectly curated influencers showcasing their
hashtag blessed lives that made avocado toast seem like a
path to financial freedom. We say farewell to entrepreneurial women
in pink power suits on the cover of magazines who
preach a set of values. They aren't living by people
(31:04):
who mistook self interest for moyal righteousness. Casting the pursuit
of profit is feminism and the consumption of one hundred
and seventy five dollars face oil made from unicorn tears.
Speaker 1 (31:15):
As self care.
Speaker 4 (31:17):
But alas, just like every great trend, there's more under
the surface. Laughing makes it easier to admit that we
got played, but we must understand the system that played
us and brought us here. After years of feeling underestimated, overlooked,
and devalued, it felt like with the rise of the
girl Boss, our hard work may finally pay off. The
(31:41):
implicit promise was that if consumers made these girl Bosses successful,
it would mean better working conditions for women, and with
that maybe empowerment for all. As Amandimule wrote in The
Atlantic in twenty twenty, maybe people could vote for equality
by buying a particular set of luggage or joining a
particular coworking space. But unfortunately, the patriarchal system that inspired
(32:06):
the girl Boss wasn't going anywhere, because the movement was
never about changing power, just wielding it. Even the term
girl boss has internalized sexism. The idea of calling a
grown woman, a CEO, a leader, A girl infantilizes her,
makes her words more palatable and less feisty. We wanted
(32:29):
it to be easy to buck the whole system. But
when it turned out that buying certain products or propping
up certain female CEOs just wasn't going to upend it all,
who did? We blame women in charge? As it turns
out women can't upend an entire system alone. We need
help from men, and that was a hard pill to
swallow for everyone. So while the concept of girl boss
(32:52):
did I think fail us, it did something great. She
emboldened us to assert power, speak frankly, and race drive.
The energy and desire for something better still exists. So
let's pour one out. Here's to the girl Boss. May
she rest in peace or reincarnate into leadership. We can
(33:13):
all be proud of a lifestyle we can maintain and
into a woman, not a girl.
Speaker 2 (33:21):
Danielle, that was beautiful, Thank you for the stabs.
Speaker 4 (33:25):
Wow, Simon, would you like to take the podium?
Speaker 2 (33:31):
Yeah, I'm ready.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
It's time.
Speaker 2 (33:37):
She believed she could, so she did, Dearly beloved, That's
how I'll remember the girl Boss. Passion, perseverance, and personality
all rolled into one pretty millennial pink package. It's hard
to believe this day is finally here. Miss Simone Voice
(34:02):
the Departed and I had a complex relationship. She probably
wouldn't remember me, but I remember the day we met
like it was yesterday. The year was twenty fourteen. I
was twenty six, wide eyed, hungry, impressionable. Manhattan called and
I answered a big girl job in the big city.
(34:25):
But it wasn't enough to get the dream job in
the real world. No, I needed a cutesy hashtag to
punctuate my humble brags in the digital world. And that's
how the Girl Boss hustled her way into my heart.
Shout out to all the girl bosses who achieved the
impossible every day tag A fellow hashtag girl Boss, I
(34:47):
declared shamelessly in February of twenty sixteen. See the girl
Boss made ambition feel accessible, at least for me. I
couldn't tell you what a KPI, CPC or ROA was,
but I was fluent in hustle quotes. I daydreamed of
boy bosses literally shaking with fear as the pants suit
(35:08):
clad departed wafted through the boardroom. She was our queen
Bee and every driven young woman with a dream found
belonging in her hive. Her influence extended all the way
from the glass ceiling to the shiny linoleum floor of
hobby Lobby, where her goddess breathed words became works of art. Quote.
(35:29):
She turned her cants into cans and her dreams into plans.
Quote I'm not bossy, I'm the boss. She got mad,
hustle and a dope soul chills. The girl Boss was
the wind beneath my millennial wings until she wasn't. I
girl bossed all the way to the top of my field,
(35:52):
only to experience more long hours, more lonely nights in
hotel rooms, more missed birthday parties. It turns out shattering
the glass ceiling wasn't as grand as the girl Boss said.
It would be more like a death by a thousand
cuts that became crystal clear. Once I graduated from girl
Boss to girl Berther after producing two airs in two years,
(36:14):
it was time to head back on the road as
a correspondent. Dutifully towed a microphone and live out of
a suitcase again, only this time I had two hearts
beating outside of my body, and I couldn't bring them
with me. And in that moment, as my own heart
was breaking, I did something I never thought I do.
(36:37):
I went against everything that departed ever taught me. I
just quit. I could hear the Girl Boss's toxic narrative
in my head. We hustled for nothing. Whatever happened to
rise and grind? Well, I guess you're gonna have to
archive all those stage photos of you holding a Starbucks
cup in one hand and a briefcase in the other.
(36:59):
And thus the most transformative promotion of my career was complete,
the one where the student becomes the teacher. My final
act of Girl bossary silencing the very voice that had
trained me all those years ago. Because the more success
I gained, the more I realized I already had everything
(37:20):
I needed. You know that saying leap and the net
will appear, Well, I'm a leeber and I have to
thank the Girl Boss for dying the net pink and
making the jump a little less intimidating. She's probably enjoying
a glass of Bella poke Brute with the other fallen angels,
negotiating a merger between heaven and purgatory as we speak.
(37:43):
Made her relentless grind always remind us the joy is
in the journey, not the destination.
Speaker 1 (37:52):
That was so beautiful to Bote.
Speaker 2 (37:54):
I feel I feel closure. I feel like a weight
has been lifted off my chest. How about you, Danielle.
Speaker 1 (38:01):
I really think she would have loved to hear your words.
Speaker 2 (38:04):
I think she would have loved yours too, especially the
part about drinking intern tears.
Speaker 1 (38:11):
I guess this means we're saying goodbye.
Speaker 2 (38:13):
We're done.
Speaker 1 (38:13):
Goodbye to the girl Boss.
Speaker 2 (38:15):
Goodbye girl Boss, good riddance, goodbye audio, Sayonara, see you later.
Speaker 4 (38:24):
Well, now that we've laid her to rest, tomorrow is
anew and we are talking about how to add a
pop of color to our lives. Here with us is
Courtney Quinn aka Color Me Courtney.
Speaker 2 (38:35):
Listen and follow the bright Side on the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can
find me, you girl, some own boys on Instagram and
TikTok and.
Speaker 4 (38:45):
I'm Danielle robe at Danielle robe on Instagram and TikTok.
Speaker 1 (38:49):
That's ro Ba.
Speaker 2 (38:50):
Y See you tomorrow. Keep looking on the bright side, y'all,
Hello Sunshine.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
Hey besties. Today on the bright side, we're paying our
respects to a concept that has weighed heavily on us,
The Girl Boss. May she rest in peace. Author and
cultural critic Lee Stein joins us to talk about the
rise and eventual downfall of the Girl Boss, and we
look ahead to the future of women in the workplace.
Speaker 3 (00:22):
I think Girl Boss the movement became synonymous with millennial
hustle culture, and I think one of the things that
would come to harm the Girl Boss in the end
was that we had the idea that if the girl
slash woman was running the company, it would be different
than when the boys ran the company.
Speaker 4 (00:39):
It's Thursday, April eleventh.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
I'm Danielle Robe.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
And I'm Simone Voice, and this is the bright side
from Hello Sunshine. Okay, so today we're trying something a
little bit new, and I'll tell you why. So I've
been feeling for a long time that we need to
properly memorialize the Girl Boss because she is an icon,
a legend, but she was ever present if you were
(01:05):
a millennial working woman between twenty fourteen to let's say
twenty twenty.
Speaker 4 (01:10):
Right, Yeah, So I think that we're going to get
into what the Girl Boss is was how it impacted
our lives in society. But I really want to hear
about how the Girl Boss impacted you personally. First were
you did you feel connected to her?
Speaker 1 (01:26):
Simone?
Speaker 2 (01:27):
I felt so connected to the Girl Boss. I mean
I was hashtagging hustle quotes on Instagram, Danielle, I was
rocking the pants suits. I mean, I probably had girl
Boss merch. It just made me feel like I was
a part of something, like I was linked to all
the other ambitious young women in my age who were climbing,
who were building. I mean I was in New York
(01:48):
City at the time whenever the Girl Boss really exploded.
So it just felt like this movement that I wanted
to be a part of. And then of course it
all came crashing down and I have a very complex
relationship with it. Now, what do you think of when
you think of the Girl Boss.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
I think of the esthetic so much.
Speaker 4 (02:05):
I think of the millennial pink and the twelve different
textures of millennial pink.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
And I think of Beyonce.
Speaker 4 (02:15):
Because there was that quote that was going around the
internet that said, you have the same amount of hours
in the day as Beyonce, and I think that idea
exemplified the Girl Boss so well, which was like hustle hard,
do the most, don't sleep, and it was all kind
of unrealistic.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
But I think that.
Speaker 4 (02:36):
The Girl Boss, for all of her wrongdoings, actually set
us up for a better place at work and in
work culture for women as a whole. And so I'm
really excited to unpack all of it with you.
Speaker 2 (02:50):
We have decided that we need to have a proper
memorial for the Girl Boss. I need some closure. I
wonder if some of our right side besties might be
fit from some closure too, So we're gonna be laying
her to rest with an expert and also a couple
of eulogies from yours.
Speaker 4 (03:07):
Truly, I think may can we call it a funeral?
I think we're having a funeral for the Girl Boss.
We are May she rest in peace.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
But first, here's what's popping on our feeds today. This
is your morning drip, y'all.
Speaker 4 (03:20):
Okay, we got to kick it off with a huge
win for women in sports because for the first time ever,
more people watch the women's NCAA championship game than the
men's game.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
We need a.
Speaker 4 (03:33):
Sound effect we need a blowhorn.
Speaker 2 (03:37):
Did you just do that with your mouth?
Speaker 1 (03:39):
Yeah? Yeah, that was incredible. You're so talented.
Speaker 4 (03:42):
I'm so excited by this because it wasn't just by
a little, it was by a lot. According to Nielsen,
which is like the ratings for television, eighteen point nine
million viewers tuned in to watch South Carolina take on
Iowa Sunday afternoon, which was the women's game, compared to
fourteen point eight million people who watch the men's championship
(04:03):
Monday night. So I'm not an expert in math, but
that's like a four million person difference.
Speaker 2 (04:07):
I think I think you're great at math, because you're
absolutely right. I mean, we are living in history right now.
This is so cool.
Speaker 4 (04:16):
Also, everybody was talking about how the women's college basketball
games were way more fun to watch this year than
the men's, and.
Speaker 1 (04:23):
That's for a lot of reasons. Like part of it is.
Speaker 4 (04:25):
That a lot of the men are going to play
pro earlier, and so it feels kind of like B
League to watch the men's right now. And the women
are just so dominant, and I'm excited to see some
of the stars that come out of the women's basketball
movement and moment right now, I.
Speaker 2 (04:43):
Think you're absolutely right. Okay, taking a hard left turn here, Danielle.
I know you're a fan. You said your favorite movie
is First Wives Club?
Speaker 4 (04:52):
Right, Oh yeah, I will watch any rom com thirty
times over.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
Okay, So, Bridget Jones, where do you stand on that
huge see? I watched them all on airplanes all the time.
Did you watch Bridget Jones? I did. Such fond memories
and more good memories are coming because she is back.
Speaker 3 (05:09):
Y'all.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
We've just learned that Renees Elwiger, Emma Thompson, and Hugh
Grant are going to reprise their roles for a fourth
Bridget Jones movie, and it's going to be called Bridget
Jones Mad About the Boy.
Speaker 4 (05:22):
We have to say that in a British accent. Mad
about the Boy.
Speaker 2 (05:25):
Mad about the Boy airs just better, not great, not
my best work. So this is actually based on the
book of the same name that came out in twenty thirteen.
This story is going to follow newly widowed Bridget as
she navigates dating as a fifty one year old single mom. Now,
of course, there are going to be some crazy hijinks,
like cooking up with a much younger man can't wait
(05:46):
to see that. I'm also curious, Danielle, to see how
they adapt this story for modern times, because it's been
a minute since we had a Bridget Jones installment.
Speaker 4 (05:55):
Yeah, and if you remember, I mean, it's ever present
on the internet. But there's a lot of parts of
this movie that worked twenty years ago that don't feel
okay in current day. One of them being I remember
when this came out, everybody was like, I can't believe
they put a plus size woman at the front and
center of a movie, and it was like she weighed
(06:16):
one hundred and thirty six pounds and was a size twelve.
So like, none of that works today, thank god, but
I do. One of the things I love about Bridget
Jones and the whole story is that she never lived
by a timeline.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
I think she has a baby at forty three.
Speaker 4 (06:33):
We see her go through life moments so candidly and
sometimes she stumbles, which I love because, especially in that
era of film, everything was about women being so perfect,
and here she was being so imperfect and so lovable.
So I am really excited for this reboot.
Speaker 2 (06:51):
I totally agree, and I think what's really cool about
this is number one, we're getting to see a portrayal
of a fifty one year old single mom, which we
don't get to see that often. But also, Renees Elwiger
is fifty four years old, and we don't often get
to see women who are her age in Hollywood getting
roles like this because they're so often erased and invisible.
So I love this for her. Nobody could have played
(07:13):
this role other than Renee, Like, she just embodies this
character so beautifully at this point, So I think it'll
be fun to see her in the modern world, Like
is she going to have a Tinder account? There's so
many ways that this could unfold.
Speaker 4 (07:26):
One thing I know for sure is she's going to
remain a clumsy, relatable queen.
Speaker 2 (07:31):
Yes, And we love a clumsy relatable queen, don't we.
Speaker 1 (07:35):
Yes, we do.
Speaker 4 (07:36):
As a girl who trips up the stairs all the time,
I appreciate clumsiness being portrayed on film.
Speaker 2 (07:41):
So maybe one of the things that Bridget Jones is
going to do, maybe she'll go to a therapist. Who knows,
we'll see.
Speaker 1 (07:47):
I would love that, big fan.
Speaker 2 (07:49):
That would be very relatable. And that reminds me of
an article that I came across this is crazy. So
AI is now making its way into mental health apps
and therapy. We are going yea start seeing AI as
a part of therapy. I mean, as a huge advocate
for therapy, I think any way that we can make
it more accessible is great. But I don't know about this.
(08:11):
This makes me kind of nervous.
Speaker 4 (08:14):
I think there's a lot of pros and cons here.
One of the things that does make me nervous simone
is that there's a lot of room for error, right
Like AI therapy and AI in general is only as
good as what it's exposed to, and so there's potentially
erroneous information via its creator that can come through. There's obviously,
(08:34):
like privacy and ethical concerns. I think my personal concern
is that it's impersonal treatment, like how is it actually
going to give proper feedback. The bright side I see
here is that a lot of times, when people, including myself,
are in pain, you just want a little connection, and
(08:56):
if you don't feel comfortable going to somebody you know,
or you don't have somebody at that moment, it's really
nice to know that there's just something there to talk to.
I just hope that the tech is good enough that
the responses back are ethical.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
I don't know. I don't know about this one. I
don't think I'm an AI therapy fan. Why does everything
have to be technology? Like, can't we just what's wrong
with regular therapy?
Speaker 1 (09:21):
Well, actually they're saying that right now.
Speaker 4 (09:25):
It's best used as a companion to in person therapy.
So your instincts are on the right track. Is this
something that you would try out?
Speaker 2 (09:35):
Gosh, that's a really good question. I don't know that
I would try this out at this point in my life,
but I can definitely remember being younger and not having
enough money to see a therapist, or having to get
over that emotional mental hurdle of like, Okay, I need therapy.
I need to go see someone, and perhaps AI could
(09:56):
help reduce that barrier to entry for a lot of people.
Speaker 4 (10:00):
Yeah, I think that's the consensus online too. I feel
nervous typing such personal information into a technological anything. It
feels like uploading your medical records or something. But I
think if you're really in pain and you need some connection,
it's not a horrible place to start.
Speaker 1 (10:21):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
I just don't know, folks, all.
Speaker 4 (10:25):
Right, I think our consensus is that We need a
little bit more information on this, but we're going to
keep an eye on it, and we're going to take
a quick break. But up next we'll be back with
writer and culture critic Lee Stein on the life and
death of the girl Boss. All right, we're back, and
(10:50):
today on the show, we're talking about the rise and
the fall of the girl Boss.
Speaker 2 (10:56):
Ooof this is a big one.
Speaker 1 (10:57):
Well, she was born in the mid twenty tens.
Speaker 4 (11:00):
She was simultaneously a power fantasy and a utopian promise.
Speaker 2 (11:04):
Oh I love that.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
I was almost tricked by her.
Speaker 4 (11:06):
The girl boss was an archetype of a successful woman.
She was confident, she was capable, and man, oman did
she love to work. And then we all discovered that
the girl boss could behave just as badly as the
boy bosses. And just as quickly as she rose to superstardom,
she started to fall.
Speaker 2 (11:23):
She crumbled, She grumbled real good. And then as recently
as this spring, Sofia Amaruso, who's the founder of Nascial
and the person who coined the term girl boss, she agreed,
it's time to put this phrase to bed. See you later,
see a later girl Boss. That's exactly what we're doing.
So here to help us eulogize the girl Boss and
(11:44):
forecast the future of work is cultural critic, writer, and,
according to Vox, the world's foremost authority on the girl Boss,
Lee Stein. Welcome, Lee, thank you.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
Okay.
Speaker 4 (11:55):
Today we're talking about the demise of the girl Boss.
But to really understand and her downfall, I think we
have to go all the way back to the beginning.
Where did the girl Boss come from?
Speaker 2 (12:06):
Lee?
Speaker 3 (12:06):
So I think it's important to understand that the girl
Boss rose in the wake of Cheryl Sandberg's famous self
help book lean In. So Cheryl Sandberg is a gen
xer and she publishes this book lean In, that becomes
this blockbuster's bestseller. That's telling other gen X women to
kind of lean in in the corporate workplace so that
they can climb the ladder and get to the c suite.
(12:28):
And then the millennial girl boss comes in and she's like,
I don't want to climb the ladder, Like I want
to disrupt this whole thing. So someone like Audrey Gellman,
who is the founder of the Wing, they come in
as disruptors, they're CEOs, and the media starts using this
word girl boss to describe them. And the word girl
boss comes from another one of these women named Sophia Amaruso,
(12:50):
who was the founder of a company called Nasty Gau,
which was kind of a fast fashion retailer, and she
wrote a memoir called hashtag girl boss, and I think
from the beginning she was using it kind of tongue
in cheek, but she coined the term and then it
started being applied to all these millennial late twenties, early
thirty somethingter female founders.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
Lee for anyone out there who doesn't know, can you
explain what is the Wing and what is nasty Gal.
Speaker 3 (13:14):
The Wing was a co working space for women that
started in New York City and it ended up spreading
to multiple locations throughout the country. But the idea was
if you were a working girl in the city and
you needed a place to send an email from your
laptop or freshen up for an event that night, you
could get a membership at the Wing. Nasty Gal was
(13:35):
started by Sophia Amarusso. She started actually selling vintage fashion
just on eBay and her business grew into this fast
fashion retailer. Within six years, her business was making one
hundred million dollars and the new York Times called her
the Cinderella of Tech.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
I'm bringing a lot of baggage to this conversation. Lee.
You don't know me, but this is a heavy one
for me because the Girl Boss sank her pretty pink
talons into me and she did not let go for
many years. And I'll tell you why. So twenty fourteen
that was kind of peak girl Boss era. I was
in my mid twenties and it was a year of
(14:13):
career first for me. I had gotten my first six
figure job as a journalist, it was my first time
living in New York City, my first dream job, and
the girl Boss it was more than just a term
to me. At that time. I was surrounded by other
high achieving, ambitious women. It felt like we were all
rising together. So that term it became this rallying cry.
(14:38):
Can you talk about that a little bit more? Because
there was this community and movement that really formed around it. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (14:44):
So I think girl Boss the movement became synonymous with
millennial hustle culture. It was work around the clock, go
for your goals. And I think one of the things
that would come to harm the Girl Boss in the
end was that we had the idea that if the
girl slash woman was running the company, it would be
different than when the boys ran the company. So we thought,
(15:07):
women help each other out, sisters help sisters. The reason
that there's all these toxic workplaces is because none of
them are run by women. If we put women in charge,
going to work will be like a utopia for everyone.
And you looked at the Instagram accounts or the websites
of these brands, and this is where the term millennial
pink is also starting to come into play. It looks soft,
(15:27):
it looks like a velvet couch, it looks like unlimited cappuccinos.
It just looks like a feminine utopia. But in fact,
as we would come to learn, women can behave badly
as much as men can behave badly. And if you
have VC funding, your imperative is to scale at any cost,
(15:48):
just like the startups founded by men. And so the
scaling mentalities started to clash with this kind of feminist,
well intentioned intention to do better for girls and women.
Speaker 4 (16:04):
Part of what I think makes the concept of girl
boss really complicated is that it essentially combined feminism with capitalism.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
Absolutely.
Speaker 4 (16:13):
What was the danger in combining these two well, I
think it set women up to fail because we didn't
say to Adam Newman at we work, like Adam Newman,
you have to be you have to be.
Speaker 3 (16:24):
The president and the founder of this company. But we
said to women like Audrey Gellman that her project was
not only capitalistic, but her project was also a form
of social justice with her goals at the Wing, And
so you're exactly right that they combined feminism and capitalism.
It was this kind of new experiment. And when I'm
looking back in hindsight at the Wing, which fell in
(16:46):
twenty twenty, she only had like.
Speaker 1 (16:48):
Three years to pull it off.
Speaker 3 (16:49):
I'm glad to use the word complicated, because I think
we can hold these women accountable for the things they
did wrong. But I don't think they're given as many
chances and opportunities to fail as the boy Boss's.
Speaker 4 (17:00):
Get There's a quote in your article that I think
drives this home. You say, the problem with making Girl
Boss feminism as a part of your brand in order
to appeal to customers was that those customers were going
to expect you to put your values into practice.
Speaker 3 (17:15):
Yeah, and I think there was a lot of criticism
of kind of the optics of Girl boss feminism. There
was a mismatch between what was presented publicly and what
was actually happening in this workplaces behind the scenes. A
lot of female founders faced criticism for their workplace environments,
including Sofia Amrusso herself. At Nasty Gal. She was actually
(17:36):
sued by several employees who said they were wrongfully terminated
for being pregnant, and that lawsuit was settled and Sofia
Amroso actually stepped down after that. Another thing that I
find interesting is how many of these girl bosses fell
in twenty twenty and were kind of publicly disgraced and
they kind of withdrew and scaled back instead of doing
(17:58):
what Adam Numan did and going big on their move.
So Audrey Gellman ended up opening a small shop. Leandre
Medine Cohen, who ran the brand Man Repeller, she closed
Man Repeller and just started a Substack newsletter. So it
makes me wonder and think about the future. You know,
It's like these women had big, bold ambitions, and where
(18:18):
does that ambition go if in the public spotlight?
Speaker 1 (18:21):
We love you and then we love to hate you.
Speaker 2 (18:24):
I want to talk about the future in just a
little bit, but before we do that. I want to
circle back to kind of the etymology of all this,
because I think how we talk about female ambition says
a lot about how we think about femininity and power.
Why do we think that we need these pop feminist
labels for things like female ambition? So do you think
(18:45):
that ideas like the girl Boss are an effort to
sanitize power because it feels like a dirty word for women.
Speaker 3 (18:52):
It's such an interesting question. I think it's important to
note that Sophia Amroso does not identify as a feminist. So, Sophia,
I'm so with Girl Boss. She's coming out as a
capitalist full stop. And where it gets tricky is when
you combine capitalism and feminism. There is this interesting trend
that I'm seeing on TikTok now where everything girly is glamorized.
(19:14):
So it's like girl walk, girl dinner, And I'm noticing
that women, adult women kind of glamorize or miss girlhood. Yeah,
And it also makes me think if that's a response
to Girl Boss, if it's like I don't want to hustle,
I want to wear bows in my hair like I
want to girl rest, it.
Speaker 2 (19:34):
Really does seem like the rise of girlhood is a
response to the harshness of the girl boss era. I mean,
so much of the girl boss movement was about suppressing
and shaming a certain kind of femininity in order to
assimilate into a male dominated workplace.
Speaker 4 (19:48):
I do also want to talk about that etymology. So
when things are labeled like man, bun or guyliner, it
means it's default female. But the girl boss was default male.
What do you think that meant?
Speaker 3 (20:03):
I think because of women's history, when we think of
success and power, we look at men and then we
plug a woman in. So we look at male suits
in the eighties and we give women's shoulder pads. It's
like just switching out one thing for another. And so
women can try to learn to act like men, they
(20:23):
can learn to act more masculine in a workplace environment,
but then they're seen as all these negative stereotypes that
they wouldn't want to be. So they're constantly trying to
navigate in between these complexities of being powerful but likable,
strong but not aggressive. And I think the girl boss
slides right in there because these millennial girl bosses were
all very beautiful women. They're very photogenic. You could put
(20:46):
them on the cover of a magazine, So they aren't
threatening in that way. They were likable, pleasing to the eye.
But they were also powerful and strong and wealthy and successful,
and so it's like they somehow they managed to tick
every single box for like five minutes before we decided
that they failed, and then we knocked them off the pedestal.
Speaker 4 (21:08):
Okay, Lee, talk to us about the Girl Boss's downfall.
What year did it all start to crumble?
Speaker 3 (21:14):
So it was crumbling in twenty nineteen and twenty twenty.
There was a big story in Verge at the end
of twenty nineteen about Steph Corey and Jen Rubio, who
were the founders of a Way Luggage, And this expose
was about this like toxic work culture, employees working around
the clock to get this luggage shipped in time for
the holiday, and this caused a huge scandal. Everyone talked
(21:37):
about it on the internet. I think it is interesting
to take a step back and contrast that with the
work culture at let's say like Twitter under Elon Musk,
and you can see people saying, oh, Elon, he's such
a complicated figure. Just the language that we use to
describe male founders compared to the way we describe female founders.
Then it got worse in twenty twenty in the pandemic
(21:57):
when we were all at home and we were two
on line. And to this day, anytime there's news about
any of these women, the cut writes a story about it,
because for some reason, we can't get enough of these stories.
What are these women doing now? We're obsessed as if
we just want them to shut up and go away?
But is that what we want? We want them to
just stop starting businesses. I don't think that that's a
(22:19):
good example either.
Speaker 1 (22:22):
We do this in pop culture. I've been seeing it
a lot with Jlo.
Speaker 4 (22:25):
Recently, there was a TikTok of a woman saying I
can't believe she paid twenty million dollars to end her
own career because people are like, it's too much, Jlo,
She's putting too much out there. Go away, And I'm thinking,
we don't say that about any male celebrity.
Speaker 3 (22:41):
We all work in a competitive industry. We work in
the media industry. I work in book publishing. We're looking
at our peers, we're looking at our friends, We're seeing
who got what. We're ambitious women, We're driven, and so
not everyone can win every prize, and so I think
watching these women fall, there's almost like a thrill in it.
To me, it becomes almost like a spectator sport totally.
(23:02):
The summer of twenty twenty, this was like our sports
game that we were watching on the internet.
Speaker 2 (23:07):
I mean, I think, in the most simple terms, it's
just misogyny. It's just the fact that there are a
lot of people still today who feel like women don't
deserve to be in any of these positions, and so
they are so eager to see them removed from them.
Speaker 1 (23:21):
Toille's point, I think women do it to other women also.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
It's true, but it's totally true. But that can that's
internalized misogyny. I mean, we see that so much.
Speaker 3 (23:29):
I don't think it's internal I wouldn't define it that
way myself. I think men know how to be physically
aggressive with one another. A man can meet another guy
outside the bar and beat his nozen. Women know how
to be socially aggressive with one another, and women know
how to destroy each other's reputations and damage each other socially.
They know how to hurt someone's feelings, and so this
(23:50):
kind of pile on with the girl bosses. I think
it's really women doing it to each other.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
So do you think that that is innate behavior or
is that something that women and have learned from observing
men in the workplace.
Speaker 3 (24:02):
No, I think women are socialized to do it to
one another because they're competing for the one guy, you know,
to be reductive and simple about it. But I think
women learn how to do this at school. I mean
they learn how to be cliquish.
Speaker 2 (24:12):
Yeah, So, Lee, I want to talk about where do
we go from here in this post girl Boss world?
Like I mentioned, the girl Boss made me feel like
I was a part of something, and I think there
are other millennial women who feel that way too. So
is there a new community that offers that today.
Speaker 3 (24:31):
I was thinking about this, and I'm glad you asked
about the word community because I was looking to kind
of compare and contrast a younger founder with the with
the millennial girl Boss. And I found this artifact from
twenty fourteen when Emily Weiss launched Glossier. The blog post
that she wrote, she said, We're laying the foundation for
(24:51):
a beauty movement, one that celebrates real girls in real life.
It has this very like aspirational empowerment toned to it.
And then I compared this with the description of Hailey
Bieber's beauty brand Road, and so she says, Road is
dedicated to making products based in science and great formulation,
simplifying many of the mysteries and complex narratives behind efficacious skincare.
(25:17):
It's so clinical and cold, like it sounds scientific, it
sounds smart, but it's not saying like girls were all
in this together. It's saying like, do you want an
effective product that works, That's why you should buy my brand.
So I'm not seeing the same kind of like we're
doing it for the sisterhood kind of branding that was
so popular among the millennial girl bosses. Another example that
(25:37):
we could talk about is Emma Chamberlain. I think of
like Emma Chamberlain as kind of a gen Z superstar
and an entrepreneur, and she started Chamberlain Coffee, but it's
still all her brand. Like she's not coming in and
saying I'm going to disrupt Starbucks. She's just saying, here's
my own coffee brand because I care about coffee, and
(25:59):
her face is all over. So I'm wondering if gen
Z is really going to be more about the personal
brand and less about scaling and disrupting the way millennials were.
Speaker 4 (26:08):
That's an interesting point, Yeah, because there is this part
of girl Boss that is the opposition. It's the disruption,
and so I do agree with you. I think that
that the personal brand is more interesting than saying I'm
going to do this totally different.
Speaker 2 (26:24):
I think that aligns with what we're hearing about younger generations,
that they have declining trust in institutions and they're more
likely to trust a personal brand.
Speaker 3 (26:34):
I think that's such a smart point. I think we
were already feeling this kind of distrust in institutions, like
we had distrust in politicians. But around the girl Boss era,
it was like, well, maybe we could trust this company
that's trying to do things differently. Maybe we could put
our trust in Everlaine. Right, maybe Everlaine will save us.
But maybe the younger generation is saying, maybe I can
only trust this personal brand. Who I think I know.
(26:57):
I think I know I'm a Chamberlain because I watch
her on YouTube. I feel like I know her. They're
in a personal, parasocial relationship with each creator or entrepreneur.
Speaker 4 (27:06):
I think that girl Boss walked so that we could
run I do feel a type of sort of disgust
if I'm being honest with the girl Boss movement, and
yet I'm so grateful to it because I do feel
like they open doors for people like Emma Chamberlain or
an every day entrepreneur, regardless of how big or small
your company is, to do it in a way that's
(27:28):
not so grand and performative.
Speaker 3 (27:32):
Something I learned is that it's always easier to criticize
than it is to build something. So it's very easy
to go on social media and knock someone down and
criticize what they've done. It takes a lot more energy
and hope and strength to create or build, and so
just to build on what you said, Danielle, like creating
or building. It doesn't have to be at scale. It
(27:53):
can start small. But I think the women that continue
to launch, create, try run expai That's what gets me excited.
That's what I try to do in my own work.
It's just like, keep creating and keep building.
Speaker 2 (28:05):
The girl Boss may be dead, but feminine ambition is
still alive and well so. According to McKinsey, women are
actually more ambitious now than before the pandemic. Quote, nine
to ten women ages thirty and under want to be
promoted to the next level, and three and four aspired
to become senior leaders. So maybe we've held on to
(28:25):
some of that ambition from the Girl Boss era.
Speaker 1 (28:27):
I think we have.
Speaker 3 (28:28):
It's still so new, like female leadership in corporate America.
We've only been doing it like the last forty fifty years.
Like there's so much further that we can go, we
just need more time to try it.
Speaker 2 (28:40):
Lee, this has been really insightful having you here. Thank
you so much. Thank you.
Speaker 3 (28:45):
I'm always happy to talk about the girl Bob.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
Lee Stein is a writer and cultural critic. For more
from the brilliant mind of Lee, check out her novels
Self Care and Land of Enchantment.
Speaker 4 (29:00):
Taking a Quick Break and then The bright Side continues
our celebration of life for the dearly departed Girl Boss.
Speaker 2 (29:17):
Before we close out the show, we both have a
few parting words that we'd like to share about The
Girl Boss are eulogies. If you will, Danielle, would you
like to go first?
Speaker 1 (29:31):
I'll start.
Speaker 4 (29:34):
Hello all, I'm Danielle Robe And while I didn't know
the Girl Boss all that well, mostly because I'm a
sleepy girl who was never willing to forego rest hours
for a powder, pink anything. As a millennial woman, I
felt like I should say a few words. The girl
boss was the epitome of empowerment, the queen of hustle,
(29:55):
the CEO of her own destiny. But she wasn't just
sipping coffe for fuel. She was gulping down tears of
her interns and calling it motivation. As we bid farewell
to the era of hashtag girl boss, we reflect on
the highs and lows of a movement that empowered women
to lean in, speak up, and hustle hard, all while
(30:19):
wearing killer heels, doing power poses, and conquering the world
one inspirational quote at a time. As we lay her
to rest, so too, dies hashtags in general, but specifically
ones like hashtag boss babe, hashtag hustle, hashtag women in Business,
and hashtag team no Sleep. We bid ad to the
(30:43):
perfectly curated Instagram feed with perfectly curated influencers showcasing their
hashtag blessed lives that made avocado toast seem like a
path to financial freedom. We say farewell to entrepreneurial women
in pink power suits on the cover of magazines who
preach a set of values. They aren't living by people
(31:04):
who mistook self interest for moyal righteousness. Casting the pursuit
of profit is feminism and the consumption of one hundred
and seventy five dollars face oil made from unicorn tears.
Speaker 1 (31:15):
As self care.
Speaker 4 (31:17):
But alas, just like every great trend, there's more under
the surface. Laughing makes it easier to admit that we
got played, but we must understand the system that played
us and brought us here. After years of feeling underestimated, overlooked,
and devalued, it felt like with the rise of the
girl Boss, our hard work may finally pay off. The
(31:41):
implicit promise was that if consumers made these girl Bosses successful,
it would mean better working conditions for women, and with
that maybe empowerment for all. As Amandimule wrote in The
Atlantic in twenty twenty, maybe people could vote for equality
by buying a particular set of luggage or joining a
particular coworking space. But unfortunately, the patriarchal system that inspired
(32:06):
the girl Boss wasn't going anywhere, because the movement was
never about changing power, just wielding it. Even the term
girl boss has internalized sexism. The idea of calling a
grown woman, a CEO, a leader, A girl infantilizes her,
makes her words more palatable and less feisty. We wanted
(32:29):
it to be easy to buck the whole system. But
when it turned out that buying certain products or propping
up certain female CEOs just wasn't going to upend it all,
who did? We blame women in charge? As it turns
out women can't upend an entire system alone. We need
help from men, and that was a hard pill to
swallow for everyone. So while the concept of girl boss
(32:52):
did I think fail us, it did something great. She
emboldened us to assert power, speak frankly, and race drive.
The energy and desire for something better still exists. So
let's pour one out. Here's to the girl Boss. May
she rest in peace or reincarnate into leadership. We can
(33:13):
all be proud of a lifestyle we can maintain and
into a woman, not a girl.
Speaker 2 (33:21):
Danielle, that was beautiful, Thank you for the stabs.
Speaker 4 (33:25):
Wow, Simon, would you like to take the podium?
Speaker 2 (33:31):
Yeah, I'm ready.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
It's time.
Speaker 2 (33:37):
She believed she could, so she did, Dearly beloved, That's
how I'll remember the girl Boss. Passion, perseverance, and personality
all rolled into one pretty millennial pink package. It's hard
to believe this day is finally here. Miss Simone Voice
(34:02):
the Departed and I had a complex relationship. She probably
wouldn't remember me, but I remember the day we met
like it was yesterday. The year was twenty fourteen. I
was twenty six, wide eyed, hungry, impressionable. Manhattan called and
I answered a big girl job in the big city.
(34:25):
But it wasn't enough to get the dream job in
the real world. No, I needed a cutesy hashtag to
punctuate my humble brags in the digital world. And that's
how the Girl Boss hustled her way into my heart.
Shout out to all the girl bosses who achieved the
impossible every day tag A fellow hashtag girl Boss, I
(34:47):
declared shamelessly in February of twenty sixteen. See the girl
Boss made ambition feel accessible, at least for me. I
couldn't tell you what a KPI, CPC or ROA was,
but I was fluent in hustle quotes. I daydreamed of
boy bosses literally shaking with fear as the pants suit
(35:08):
clad departed wafted through the boardroom. She was our queen
Bee and every driven young woman with a dream found
belonging in her hive. Her influence extended all the way
from the glass ceiling to the shiny linoleum floor of
hobby Lobby, where her goddess breathed words became works of art. Quote.
(35:29):
She turned her cants into cans and her dreams into plans.
Quote I'm not bossy, I'm the boss. She got mad,
hustle and a dope soul chills. The girl Boss was
the wind beneath my millennial wings until she wasn't. I
girl bossed all the way to the top of my field,
(35:52):
only to experience more long hours, more lonely nights in
hotel rooms, more missed birthday parties. It turns out shattering
the glass ceiling wasn't as grand as the girl Boss said.
It would be more like a death by a thousand
cuts that became crystal clear. Once I graduated from girl
Boss to girl Berther after producing two airs in two years,
(36:14):
it was time to head back on the road as
a correspondent. Dutifully towed a microphone and live out of
a suitcase again, only this time I had two hearts
beating outside of my body, and I couldn't bring them
with me. And in that moment, as my own heart
was breaking, I did something I never thought I do.
(36:37):
I went against everything that departed ever taught me. I
just quit. I could hear the Girl Boss's toxic narrative
in my head. We hustled for nothing. Whatever happened to
rise and grind? Well, I guess you're gonna have to
archive all those stage photos of you holding a Starbucks
cup in one hand and a briefcase in the other.
(36:59):
And thus the most transformative promotion of my career was complete,
the one where the student becomes the teacher. My final
act of Girl bossary silencing the very voice that had
trained me all those years ago. Because the more success
I gained, the more I realized I already had everything
(37:20):
I needed. You know that saying leap and the net
will appear, Well, I'm a leeber and I have to
thank the Girl Boss for dying the net pink and
making the jump a little less intimidating. She's probably enjoying
a glass of Bella poke Brute with the other fallen angels,
negotiating a merger between heaven and purgatory as we speak.
(37:43):
Made her relentless grind always remind us the joy is
in the journey, not the destination.
Speaker 1 (37:52):
That was so beautiful to Bote.
Speaker 2 (37:54):
I feel I feel closure. I feel like a weight
has been lifted off my chest. How about you, Danielle.
Speaker 1 (38:01):
I really think she would have loved to hear your words.
Speaker 2 (38:04):
I think she would have loved yours too, especially the
part about drinking intern tears.
Speaker 1 (38:11):
I guess this means we're saying goodbye.
Speaker 2 (38:13):
We're done.
Speaker 1 (38:13):
Goodbye to the girl Boss.
Speaker 2 (38:15):
Goodbye girl Boss, good riddance, goodbye audio, Sayonara, see you later.
Speaker 4 (38:24):
Well, now that we've laid her to rest, tomorrow is
anew and we are talking about how to add a
pop of color to our lives. Here with us is
Courtney Quinn aka Color Me Courtney.
Speaker 2 (38:35):
Listen and follow the bright Side on the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can
find me, you girl, some own boys on Instagram and
TikTok and.
Speaker 4 (38:45):
I'm Danielle robe at Danielle robe on Instagram and TikTok.
Speaker 1 (38:49):
That's ro Ba.
Speaker 2 (38:50):
Y See you tomorrow. Keep looking on the bright side, y'all,
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