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Girl on Girl: How Pop Culture Turned a Generation of Women Against Themselves
From Atlantic critic and Pulitzer Prize finalist Sophie Gilbert, a blazing critique of how early-aughts pop culture turned women and girls against each other—and themselves—with disastrous consequences
When did feminism lose its way? This question feels increasingly urgent in a moment of reactionary cultural and legislative backlash, when widespread uncertainty about the movement’s power, focus, and currency threatens decades of progress.
Sophie Gilbert, a staff writer at The Atlantic and finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in criticism, provides one answer, identifying an inflection point in the late 1990s and early 2000s when the energy of third-wave and “riot girl” feminism collapsed into a regressive period of hyper-objectification, sexualization, and infantilization. Gilbert mines the darker side of nostalgia, training her keen analytic eye on the most revealing cultural objects of the era, across music, film, television, fashion, tabloid journalism, and more. And what she recounts is harrowing, from the unattainable aesthetic of Victoria’s Secret ads and explicit music videos to a burgeoning internet culture vicious towards women in the spotlight and damaging for those who weren’t. Gilbert tracks many of the period’s dominant themes back to the explosion of internet porn, tracing its widespread influence as it began to pervade our collective consciousness.
Gilbert paints a devastating picture of an era when a distinctly American confluence of excess, materialism, and power-worship collided with the culture’s reactionary, puritanical, and chauvinistic currents. Amid a collective reconsideration of the way women are treated in public, Girl on Girl is a blistering indictment of the matrix of misogyny that undergirded the cultural production of the early twenty-first century, and how it continues to shape our world today.
When did feminism lose its way? This question feels increasingly urgent in a moment of reactionary cultural and legislative backlash, when widespread uncertainty about the movement’s power, focus, and currency threatens decades of progress.
Sophie Gilbert, a staff writer at The Atlantic and finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in criticism, provides one answer, identifying an inflection point in the late 1990s and early 2000s when the energy of third-wave and “riot girl” feminism collapsed into a regressive period of hyper-objectification, sexualization, and infantilization. Gilbert mines the darker side of nostalgia, training her keen analytic eye on the most revealing cultural objects of the era, across music, film, television, fashion, tabloid journalism, and more. And what she recounts is harrowing, from the unattainable aesthetic of Victoria’s Secret ads and explicit music videos to a burgeoning internet culture vicious towards women in the spotlight and damaging for those who weren’t. Gilbert tracks many of the period’s dominant themes back to the explosion of internet porn, tracing its widespread influence as it began to pervade our collective consciousness.
Gilbert paints a devastating picture of an era when a distinctly American confluence of excess, materialism, and power-worship collided with the culture’s reactionary, puritanical, and chauvinistic currents. Amid a collective reconsideration of the way women are treated in public, Girl on Girl is a blistering indictment of the matrix of misogyny that undergirded the cultural production of the early twenty-first century, and how it continues to shape our world today.
352 pages, Hardcover
First published April 29, 2025
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 296 reviews
June 21, 2025
Gilbert was inspired to write this book by the reversal of Roe v. Wade, her goal is to illuminate how even in recent years, the cultural mainstream delighted in the violation, shaming and humiliation of women. Recently, there have been quite some books on how the media exploited Britney and Paris, and how the Kardashians have perverted the body image (to their own detriment, if you listen to them), but Gilbert dives way deeper, focusing especially on the pornification of pop culture - and we're not talking about female sexual empowerment, but the capitalist dehumanization and commodification of the female body as the incel movement demands it. Her examples range from teen comedies like "American Pie" to the Abu Ghraib photos, and as she is a superb non-fiction writer, the text is captivating and highly engaging.
The book starts off with the backlash to feminism in the 1990's, Gilbert ponders how the supermodels were exchanged with frail teenage bodies in the heroin chic years ruled by the sleazy-cool exploitation of people like Terry Richardson (do you know balloon animal dude Jeff Koons? And did you know that at the time, he was married to a porn star and made, well, porn that was exhibited in galleries?). She connects the American teen comedy about boys obsessed with losing their virginity to the incel movement, then talks about New French extremity and, sure, "Hostel". Reality TV is a major topic, beauty standards and products, the rise of violence and degradation as a movie trope in the porn industry and digital gateways like OnlyFans.
Many of these themes will sound familiar, but how convincingly Gilbert relates it to porn (and not of the Erika Lust type: Lust herself features in the book, and Gilbert is not against porn, she is just against misogynist porn), and how she finds incels and the manosphere in cultural products that preceeded these phenomena, products that at first glance appear harmless, is very enlightening. Gilbert writes against the normalization of misogyny as entertainment in a world where a man who illegally paid hush money to a porn star was elected US President. And she shows that progress may not be linear, but it is possible.
The book starts off with the backlash to feminism in the 1990's, Gilbert ponders how the supermodels were exchanged with frail teenage bodies in the heroin chic years ruled by the sleazy-cool exploitation of people like Terry Richardson (do you know balloon animal dude Jeff Koons? And did you know that at the time, he was married to a porn star and made, well, porn that was exhibited in galleries?). She connects the American teen comedy about boys obsessed with losing their virginity to the incel movement, then talks about New French extremity and, sure, "Hostel". Reality TV is a major topic, beauty standards and products, the rise of violence and degradation as a movie trope in the porn industry and digital gateways like OnlyFans.
Many of these themes will sound familiar, but how convincingly Gilbert relates it to porn (and not of the Erika Lust type: Lust herself features in the book, and Gilbert is not against porn, she is just against misogynist porn), and how she finds incels and the manosphere in cultural products that preceeded these phenomena, products that at first glance appear harmless, is very enlightening. Gilbert writes against the normalization of misogyny as entertainment in a world where a man who illegally paid hush money to a porn star was elected US President. And she shows that progress may not be linear, but it is possible.
June 25, 2025
Very liberal
Read my full review here:
Read my full review here:
May 12, 2025
Truly it’s a wonder we made it out alive.
May 17, 2025
Wow, I was blown away by this book. The author examines the ways women have been portrayed over the last 35 years of pop culture, with a specific focused on the Y2K era. For millennials especially, this is an invitation to look back on the era that shaped us…and reflect on the many ways in which it was completely messed up. Yes, a reporter did write about how he ascertained 18-year-old Lindsay Lohan’s boobs were real (she said so, but his visual examination and goodbye hug confirmed it 🤮). Yes, a movie starring Paris Hilton was pitched with the slogan “See Paris Die!” And a preteen Kylie Jenner really did pole dance on TV. None of this was a fever dream.
What sets this book apart, beyond the journalistic work that went into it, is the author’s analysis of cultural trends. She has very interesting insights on how, for instance, those in power appropriated the riot grrrl movement and turned it into a softened “girl power” message (but don’t worry, Spice Girls, I still love you!) or how record executives redirected hip-hop artists’ anger at society into anger at women. She talks about the different ways white women and BIPOC women were harmed by Y2K pop culture’s messages, and the way pressure to be skinny turned into pressure to have the equally unattainable Kardashian curves. It seems that with every bit of progress feminism makes received pushback in the form of societal regression.
Still, the ultimate message of this book is a hopeful one. By pointing to the ways that pop cultural messages rise and fall in popularity, the author sends the message that current troubling trends, like the tradwife movement, will not last forever.
Thank you to the publisher for gifting me a copy of this book!
What sets this book apart, beyond the journalistic work that went into it, is the author’s analysis of cultural trends. She has very interesting insights on how, for instance, those in power appropriated the riot grrrl movement and turned it into a softened “girl power” message (but don’t worry, Spice Girls, I still love you!) or how record executives redirected hip-hop artists’ anger at society into anger at women. She talks about the different ways white women and BIPOC women were harmed by Y2K pop culture’s messages, and the way pressure to be skinny turned into pressure to have the equally unattainable Kardashian curves. It seems that with every bit of progress feminism makes received pushback in the form of societal regression.
Still, the ultimate message of this book is a hopeful one. By pointing to the ways that pop cultural messages rise and fall in popularity, the author sends the message that current troubling trends, like the tradwife movement, will not last forever.
Thank you to the publisher for gifting me a copy of this book!
June 8, 2025
3.5
Kind of conflicted on how to rate this because i think gilbert achieved what she set out to with this: cataloguing the past few decades of interaction between pop culture, women and feminism through various topics. You get everything from the riot grrrl to pop star transition, housewives and reality tv, the “confessional first person female writer” persona, #girlboss and lots more. What works against the book is that if you’ve paid a decent amount of attention to any of these topics (which is likely the case for the majority of people who would be interested in reading), most of this feels like going over a well trodden path. Gilbert makes some interesting connections and observations through laying out the topics chronologically by when they reached the mainstream but this book was much more focused on the historical outlining. Nothing wrong with that, again I don’t think gilbert’s goal was to reinvent the wheel here, more to generally catalogue, but because of that I found this leaned on the tedious side more often than not.
Kind of conflicted on how to rate this because i think gilbert achieved what she set out to with this: cataloguing the past few decades of interaction between pop culture, women and feminism through various topics. You get everything from the riot grrrl to pop star transition, housewives and reality tv, the “confessional first person female writer” persona, #girlboss and lots more. What works against the book is that if you’ve paid a decent amount of attention to any of these topics (which is likely the case for the majority of people who would be interested in reading), most of this feels like going over a well trodden path. Gilbert makes some interesting connections and observations through laying out the topics chronologically by when they reached the mainstream but this book was much more focused on the historical outlining. Nothing wrong with that, again I don’t think gilbert’s goal was to reinvent the wheel here, more to generally catalogue, but because of that I found this leaned on the tedious side more often than not.
May 22, 2025
So good, so important, absolutely required reading for millennial women, millennials, women, and everyone else. Here for the vindication of Girls as feminist, here for the girlboss/lean in takedowns, here for the analysis of hip hop culture taking refuge in misogyny when it needed somewhere to punch down to. Gilbert’s analysis of female autofiction was also just 👌🏻👌🏻👌🏻
++++
Review for LARB here:
++++
Review for LARB here:
April 6, 2025
4.5/5
This is my kind of non-fiction. Reminiscent of pop-culture essays (which tracks as Gilbert writes for The Atlantic), Girl On Girl tackles it all- the music industry, the porn industry, reality tv, paparazzi, politics, and social media- and how it connects to the realities of women everywhere. As a girl mom and a high school teacher, the way women are portrayed in the media is always at the forefront of my mind. The resurgence of diet culture and decline of body positivity in the past year has been alarming, and it’s important that we continue to use our voices loudly so this generation of women aren’t impacted the way mine was by what they consume. Will be recommending this to everyone!
Thank you to Penguin Random House Canada for the advanced copy!
This is my kind of non-fiction. Reminiscent of pop-culture essays (which tracks as Gilbert writes for The Atlantic), Girl On Girl tackles it all- the music industry, the porn industry, reality tv, paparazzi, politics, and social media- and how it connects to the realities of women everywhere. As a girl mom and a high school teacher, the way women are portrayed in the media is always at the forefront of my mind. The resurgence of diet culture and decline of body positivity in the past year has been alarming, and it’s important that we continue to use our voices loudly so this generation of women aren’t impacted the way mine was by what they consume. Will be recommending this to everyone!
Thank you to Penguin Random House Canada for the advanced copy!
May 10, 2025
Unfassbar aufschluss- und lehrreich! Habe viele popkulturelle Ereignisse so nochmal besser beleuchtet bekommen und gerade für meinen Job als Filmkritikerin ist dieses Sachbuch ein echtes Schätzchen.
May 14, 2025
(3.5 stars) Investigative journalism examining how Western women have been portrayed and analyzed through media, entertainment, politics, etc.. This is the type of book, where after you finish reading it, you feel (if you're at all engaged in current events and pop culture) there wasn't a lot of new information here. But its effectiveness is having all the history, all the examples, all the incidents laid out this way - the evidence is relentless. It forces you to analyze your own part in creating the narrative. I'm Gen X, and it's always fascinating looking back at the music, TV shows, and movies that shaped my formative years. Reading 'Girl on Girl' provided many 'How did I not see that?!?!!' moments.
The structure of this book was a bit of a mess, however. There was so much shocking information, but little time was spent on each topic before moving on to the next equally shocking and sensationalist topic. At times it felt like reading a list, with minimal reflection and insight. I would have preferred less shock and awe, and more of a deep dive into fewer topics.
The structure of this book was a bit of a mess, however. There was so much shocking information, but little time was spent on each topic before moving on to the next equally shocking and sensationalist topic. At times it felt like reading a list, with minimal reflection and insight. I would have preferred less shock and awe, and more of a deep dive into fewer topics.
June 18, 2025
Such an interesting read. I was reminded of a lot of things that were happening around me in wider culture as I was growing up. And even though there were a lot of things that I didn't pay much attention to, or didn't feel relevant to me, this book definitely makes me see the wider cultural impacts.
May 29, 2025
One of the most enraging books I’ve ever read. A must read for all.
May 18, 2025
Sophie Gilbert is British writer on staff at The Atlantic; she's also an elder Millennial whose teens and twenties dovetailed with the early 21st century, the time period she focuses on in her 2025 popular sociology book Girl on Girl. I think it's inevitable as our generation ages up (speaking as a fellow Millennial) that we become more retrospective and reflective of the era that shaped our adolescence and young adulthood; Girl on Girl joins a growing body of books on this topic (see further reading below).
Gilbert explores various cultural touchstones of the 1990s, 2000s, and 2010s through the lens of how women were portrayed (and the broader sociological impacts of these representations trickled into popular culture and the psyches of young people during that era like Gilbert and the other authors linked below). The book is divided into chapters that discuss women in music, women in fashion, women in the adult entertainment industry, women on reality TV and in the early influencer era, etc. (with the music chapter dovetailing quite closely with Tanya Pearson's excellent recent book, , where she delves a lot more deeply into the rise and fall of women in rock in the '90s and early '00s).
I would say the narrative overall is progressive-leaning, though I think those of most ideologies can look back on some of the social moraes of the '00s and realize that society is generally more accepting now. It's a fine line here -- one of my biggest nonfiction pet peeves is judging the morals and behaviors of the past by today's standards, yet now that 20-25 years have elapsed from the Y2K era and those of us who were teens then have strong feelings now that inevitably veer into that tendency. It's incredibly hard to write about the recent past that we also lived through with objectivity and the benefit of even more time passing and further maturation and perspective-building. One wonders how the 2000s (and for that matter, the 2020s) will be viewed with several more decades of hindsight.
Further reading: Millennials revisiting the cultural zeitgeists of their formative years (ordered from most recommended to least recommended)
by Vauhini Vara
by Sarah Ditum
by Anne Helen Petersen
by Britney Spears
by Jia Tolentino
by Jessica Simpson
by Kate Flannery
by Kate Kennedy
by Colette Shade
My statistics:
Book 152 for 2025
Book 2078 cumulatively
Gilbert explores various cultural touchstones of the 1990s, 2000s, and 2010s through the lens of how women were portrayed (and the broader sociological impacts of these representations trickled into popular culture and the psyches of young people during that era like Gilbert and the other authors linked below). The book is divided into chapters that discuss women in music, women in fashion, women in the adult entertainment industry, women on reality TV and in the early influencer era, etc. (with the music chapter dovetailing quite closely with Tanya Pearson's excellent recent book, , where she delves a lot more deeply into the rise and fall of women in rock in the '90s and early '00s).
I would say the narrative overall is progressive-leaning, though I think those of most ideologies can look back on some of the social moraes of the '00s and realize that society is generally more accepting now. It's a fine line here -- one of my biggest nonfiction pet peeves is judging the morals and behaviors of the past by today's standards, yet now that 20-25 years have elapsed from the Y2K era and those of us who were teens then have strong feelings now that inevitably veer into that tendency. It's incredibly hard to write about the recent past that we also lived through with objectivity and the benefit of even more time passing and further maturation and perspective-building. One wonders how the 2000s (and for that matter, the 2020s) will be viewed with several more decades of hindsight.
Further reading: Millennials revisiting the cultural zeitgeists of their formative years (ordered from most recommended to least recommended)
by Vauhini Vara
by Sarah Ditum
by Anne Helen Petersen
by Britney Spears
by Jia Tolentino
by Jessica Simpson
by Kate Flannery
by Kate Kennedy
by Colette Shade
My statistics:
Book 152 for 2025
Book 2078 cumulatively
April 29, 2025
An investigative odyssey into modern pop culture, from the 90s-today. From Madonna’s Sex book to the #Girlboss era, Sophie Gilbert takes us back through the pornified pervasive culture of our millennial foundations.
Wow, it was truly horrifying to see how wild and misogynistic mainstream pop culture (music, movies, celebrity) was when I was growing up (and still is). There’s been a very clear pathway from then to now and the trad-wife/incel epidemic. Of course we couldn’t discern this growing up, but it was really eye opening to journey back through it all.
This is such a HUGE topic, and I think Gilbert does an excellent job of hitting major touchstones. Including, the Spice Girls, Britney Spears debut, Janet Jackson’s Super Bowl performance, early reality TV (An American Family, Flavor of Love, The Real Housewives franchise, etc.), American Pie, Hostel, Girls, Glossier, the list goes on.
This is a must read for millennials, gen-z, and anyone interested in pop culture. I’m so happy it’s out in the world and I can’t wait to talk about it with everyone!
Thank you to the publisher for the ARC.
Wow, it was truly horrifying to see how wild and misogynistic mainstream pop culture (music, movies, celebrity) was when I was growing up (and still is). There’s been a very clear pathway from then to now and the trad-wife/incel epidemic. Of course we couldn’t discern this growing up, but it was really eye opening to journey back through it all.
This is such a HUGE topic, and I think Gilbert does an excellent job of hitting major touchstones. Including, the Spice Girls, Britney Spears debut, Janet Jackson’s Super Bowl performance, early reality TV (An American Family, Flavor of Love, The Real Housewives franchise, etc.), American Pie, Hostel, Girls, Glossier, the list goes on.
This is a must read for millennials, gen-z, and anyone interested in pop culture. I’m so happy it’s out in the world and I can’t wait to talk about it with everyone!
Thank you to the publisher for the ARC.
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June 30, 2025
As someone who came of age in the early 00s (and recently celebrated a 20-year high school graduation anniversary thing...did I go? Fuck no but the age is kicking me in the ass), I've been wanting to look back more at the weird cluster fuck those of us to came of age in the time of 9/11, Paris Hilton and the Great Recession. Not from nostalgia, but to examine the events of the 00s that are leading us to today. Especially since the fashion and health cycles are primed and pumping on bringing us 20 years into the past.
Anywho, the early 00s were bleak. I think Mean Girls does a good job of capturing the essence of what it was like in a lot of ways, although obviously the issues couldn't be settled as easily as "just let people do their thing in peace."
But Gilbert does a fantastic job of breaking down sectors of society: politics, music, reality tv, celebrity, diet and more to really did into what made Gen X and millennials so fucked up. While the narrative is overwhelmingly straight and white (and touches a lot on the interesting aspects of white feminism that make it abhorrently NOT feminist), she also examines the fetishization and misogynoir of Black women during this period, and touches on some queer and trans lines.
TL;DR, when people sell "empowerment" with words that prominently feature "girl," be wary. Also, diets are a scam and you shouldn't ever shrink yourself in any way in order to fit in. Second also, fuck all MLMs (you aren't a boss or SHEO if you don't set your own prices). Final als0: capitalism taints everything.
Anywho, the early 00s were bleak. I think Mean Girls does a good job of capturing the essence of what it was like in a lot of ways, although obviously the issues couldn't be settled as easily as "just let people do their thing in peace."
But Gilbert does a fantastic job of breaking down sectors of society: politics, music, reality tv, celebrity, diet and more to really did into what made Gen X and millennials so fucked up. While the narrative is overwhelmingly straight and white (and touches a lot on the interesting aspects of white feminism that make it abhorrently NOT feminist), she also examines the fetishization and misogynoir of Black women during this period, and touches on some queer and trans lines.
TL;DR, when people sell "empowerment" with words that prominently feature "girl," be wary. Also, diets are a scam and you shouldn't ever shrink yourself in any way in order to fit in. Second also, fuck all MLMs (you aren't a boss or SHEO if you don't set your own prices). Final als0: capitalism taints everything.
Read
May 12, 2025Chapters 9 and 10 lost me a bit but overall this was a super nostalgic and interesting read. However, major TW’s for very graphic discussion on porn culture, rape, violence against women, etc. I personally found the second half of the book to be quite unrelenting compared to the more pop culture centered first half.
May 14, 2025
In Sophie Gilbert’s journalistic non-fiction text, Girl On Girl: How Pop Culture Turned a Generation of Women Against Themselves, she recounts in the excellent first chapter how the slogan that was later co-opted by the Spice Girls, ‘Girl Power’, came into being in 1991:
Kathleen Hanna was… preoccupied with the fanzine she was making for her punk band, Bikini Kill. Hanna had been reading some of the feminist psychologist Carol Gilligan’s work on adolescent girlhood, confidence and resistance and was brainstorming titles for her next zine with Bikini Kill’s drummer, Tobi Vail. “Let’s put a word with ‘girl’ that doesn’t usually go with ‘girl'”, Hanna recalls suggesting… “Power,” Vail replied. “Girl Power”.
As Gilbert argues, ‘the story of what happened to the feminist movement during the 1990s’, at least in the music industry, ‘can be told by tracing the evolution of a single slogan’. Bikini Kill pioneered the riot grrrl movement in punk, which focused on female oppression and exploitative capitalism, protesting how little space there had been for women in earlier punk cultures through DIY zines that used cuttings from other texts to analyse popular culture. But by 1996, when the Spice Girls came into being, feminism had become postfeminism; teenage girls were being told they no longer needed an organised liberation movement because they already had it all. I loved Gilbert’s skewering of their aesthetic, which immediately took me back to the ‘Wannabe’ video: ‘If the emerging model for pop stars was “sexy teenager”, the Spice Girls were sexy women who behaved like toddlers at a wedding: grabbing things at random, spinning round and round and round, throwing food on the floor. They embodied “freedom” if you understood that concept as “total absence of impulse control”'.
This is the material that I’d hoped Gilbert’s book would be about, and which I felt was promised by its title. How were millennial girls turned against each other by a popular culture that told them feminism was unnecessary, unfashionable and, worst of all – just not sexy? But sadly, after this strong opening, Girl on Girl rapidly goes downhill, retreading familiar ground about body image, sexualisation and porn without having anything to say about how girls and women actually reacted to this culture. Girl on Girl clearly wants to be Backlash for the late 1990s/early 00s, but one of the notable strengths of Susan Faludi’s 1991 classic was how she showed that women are not helpless victims of anti-feminist backlashes. In the 1980s, American women gave the highest ratings to TV shows that had independent heroines, rejected ‘puffball’ fashion for suits and leggings, and continued to postpone marriage and childbearing as they entered the workforce in record numbers. Gilbert ignores anything that was happening outside the world of reality TV, porn, celebrity gossip and fashion and – worse – assumes that teenagers simply absorbed these messages uncritically. To highlight just one counter-trend that returns to the girl/witch binary: the late 1990s also saw a flowering of ‘teen witch’ culture, driven by Sabrina the Teenage Witch (1996-2003), films like The Craft (1996), books like Cate Tiernan’s Sweep series (2001-3), and teenage girls’ genuine interest in paganism and Wicca. The 1990s and 2000s desperately need serious critical historical attention, but this isn't it.
I received a free proof copy of this book from the publisher for review.
Kathleen Hanna was… preoccupied with the fanzine she was making for her punk band, Bikini Kill. Hanna had been reading some of the feminist psychologist Carol Gilligan’s work on adolescent girlhood, confidence and resistance and was brainstorming titles for her next zine with Bikini Kill’s drummer, Tobi Vail. “Let’s put a word with ‘girl’ that doesn’t usually go with ‘girl'”, Hanna recalls suggesting… “Power,” Vail replied. “Girl Power”.
As Gilbert argues, ‘the story of what happened to the feminist movement during the 1990s’, at least in the music industry, ‘can be told by tracing the evolution of a single slogan’. Bikini Kill pioneered the riot grrrl movement in punk, which focused on female oppression and exploitative capitalism, protesting how little space there had been for women in earlier punk cultures through DIY zines that used cuttings from other texts to analyse popular culture. But by 1996, when the Spice Girls came into being, feminism had become postfeminism; teenage girls were being told they no longer needed an organised liberation movement because they already had it all. I loved Gilbert’s skewering of their aesthetic, which immediately took me back to the ‘Wannabe’ video: ‘If the emerging model for pop stars was “sexy teenager”, the Spice Girls were sexy women who behaved like toddlers at a wedding: grabbing things at random, spinning round and round and round, throwing food on the floor. They embodied “freedom” if you understood that concept as “total absence of impulse control”'.
This is the material that I’d hoped Gilbert’s book would be about, and which I felt was promised by its title. How were millennial girls turned against each other by a popular culture that told them feminism was unnecessary, unfashionable and, worst of all – just not sexy? But sadly, after this strong opening, Girl on Girl rapidly goes downhill, retreading familiar ground about body image, sexualisation and porn without having anything to say about how girls and women actually reacted to this culture. Girl on Girl clearly wants to be Backlash for the late 1990s/early 00s, but one of the notable strengths of Susan Faludi’s 1991 classic was how she showed that women are not helpless victims of anti-feminist backlashes. In the 1980s, American women gave the highest ratings to TV shows that had independent heroines, rejected ‘puffball’ fashion for suits and leggings, and continued to postpone marriage and childbearing as they entered the workforce in record numbers. Gilbert ignores anything that was happening outside the world of reality TV, porn, celebrity gossip and fashion and – worse – assumes that teenagers simply absorbed these messages uncritically. To highlight just one counter-trend that returns to the girl/witch binary: the late 1990s also saw a flowering of ‘teen witch’ culture, driven by Sabrina the Teenage Witch (1996-2003), films like The Craft (1996), books like Cate Tiernan’s Sweep series (2001-3), and teenage girls’ genuine interest in paganism and Wicca. The 1990s and 2000s desperately need serious critical historical attention, but this isn't it.
I received a free proof copy of this book from the publisher for review.
May 26, 2025
Rounding up. Not groundbreaking but I good synthesis that talks about a lot of stuff I like
June 25, 2025
I love women and hate how the world treats them
June 3, 2025
Millennial ladies, there’s a lot to unpack here. Atlantic journalist Sophie Gilbert thoroughly explores early-aught pop culture influence, and how we were conditioned to treat ourselves and one another. Fascinating and a bit devastating. A must-read!
June 23, 2025
This is a much longer and significantly more serious review than I typically write about my reads. I started writing this review before I was even half way through the book, but I felt the need to organize my thoughts as I read through Gilbert’s extensive library of pop culture’s sins against women. If not, I worried I’d get lost in this damning and tragic list of its crimes.
Each chapter examined a new aspect of pop culture. Rather than expound on her own theories about the effect of pop culture on women, Gilbert presented the facts in a way that would do the arguing for her. The result is an exhausting, precise, and exacting timeline of all the ways that pop culture has hated women and fed us all a hatred of women.
—
A few notes on this:
First: I say “exhausting” because sometimes I would have to put the book down to distance myself from a voice which would creep into my head and demand that I be outraged. Outrage is an emotion I have found (in my own life) leads to bitterness, which I’ve tried to systematically spit out anytime I taste it. The response (my righteous indignation) that this book invoked made it hard to read.
It both affirms me as a woman (here are all the people and markets and pop culture ecosystems that prey on me as a woman! Behold, the decades and millions of dollars invested in victimizing me!) and makes me uncomfortable in my own skin to bear witness to all the ways being a woman in today’s culture appears to be an unsolvable puzzle.
Second: I say that “Gilbert presented the facts in a way that would do the arguing for her” because this is a book which looks at pop culture over thirty years and isolates certain instances to support Gilbert’s broader thesis. Do I necessarily disagree with her conclusions that culture has shaped women’s identity, influenced by a myriad of shadow forces (the porn industry being the most sinister)? No. In reality, I’m quite swayed by her points. But with a book like this, there must be a necessary trust between the reader and the author because Gilbert cannot talk about everything. She must pick and choose. I read this book and felt keenly how certain anecdotes were inflated to make certain points. I wonder if this could have been avoidable? I’m unsure but ultimately do find her expansive Rolodex of pop culture facts impressive.
—
So what’s the verdict? Mostly, I am just grateful I was not attuned to pop culture as a child. A homeschooler without a phone— I thank my lucky stars! Had I been consuming the content described in this book, I would be a different person.
But more seriously, I think Gilbert does something important too. It made me sad, angry, upset— but better informed too. To quote Gilbert, this book revealed “all the ways in which womanhood has been tailored into something narrow and even archaic, by a media culture that has trained us to surveil ourselves and adjust things accordingly.”
Each chapter examined a new aspect of pop culture. Rather than expound on her own theories about the effect of pop culture on women, Gilbert presented the facts in a way that would do the arguing for her. The result is an exhausting, precise, and exacting timeline of all the ways that pop culture has hated women and fed us all a hatred of women.
—
A few notes on this:
First: I say “exhausting” because sometimes I would have to put the book down to distance myself from a voice which would creep into my head and demand that I be outraged. Outrage is an emotion I have found (in my own life) leads to bitterness, which I’ve tried to systematically spit out anytime I taste it. The response (my righteous indignation) that this book invoked made it hard to read.
It both affirms me as a woman (here are all the people and markets and pop culture ecosystems that prey on me as a woman! Behold, the decades and millions of dollars invested in victimizing me!) and makes me uncomfortable in my own skin to bear witness to all the ways being a woman in today’s culture appears to be an unsolvable puzzle.
Second: I say that “Gilbert presented the facts in a way that would do the arguing for her” because this is a book which looks at pop culture over thirty years and isolates certain instances to support Gilbert’s broader thesis. Do I necessarily disagree with her conclusions that culture has shaped women’s identity, influenced by a myriad of shadow forces (the porn industry being the most sinister)? No. In reality, I’m quite swayed by her points. But with a book like this, there must be a necessary trust between the reader and the author because Gilbert cannot talk about everything. She must pick and choose. I read this book and felt keenly how certain anecdotes were inflated to make certain points. I wonder if this could have been avoidable? I’m unsure but ultimately do find her expansive Rolodex of pop culture facts impressive.
—
So what’s the verdict? Mostly, I am just grateful I was not attuned to pop culture as a child. A homeschooler without a phone— I thank my lucky stars! Had I been consuming the content described in this book, I would be a different person.
But more seriously, I think Gilbert does something important too. It made me sad, angry, upset— but better informed too. To quote Gilbert, this book revealed “all the ways in which womanhood has been tailored into something narrow and even archaic, by a media culture that has trained us to surveil ourselves and adjust things accordingly.”
June 9, 2025
I think I’ve read most - if not all - of these criticisms before so it wasn’t very fresh or exciting.
I was not prepared for how much porn is centered and vilified. Which is fine - I think she has a point in some cases. But if I knew I’d be reading graphic, sterile descriptions of violent pornographic scenes I probably wouldn’t have picked this up.
Mostly this was depressing, and then I think Gilbert must have realized that, so she made a last ditch effort to provide a light at the end of the tunnel in the final chapter.
She almost got somewhere but many others have beat her there.
2.5 maybe a 3?
I was not prepared for how much porn is centered and vilified. Which is fine - I think she has a point in some cases. But if I knew I’d be reading graphic, sterile descriptions of violent pornographic scenes I probably wouldn’t have picked this up.
Mostly this was depressing, and then I think Gilbert must have realized that, so she made a last ditch effort to provide a light at the end of the tunnel in the final chapter.
She almost got somewhere but many others have beat her there.
2.5 maybe a 3?
May 11, 2025
Great companion piece to Sarah Wynn Williams’ “Careless People” - as well as the autobiographies of Paris Hilton & Britney Spears. Reading these four all within just a year (or maybe a year and half?) was a powerful experience that explains a LOT about the world we’re living in now. The casual misogyny of pop culture and porn have formed the beliefs and attitudes of a generation, and we are now reaping the fruits of it. Lack of bodily autonomy, two smart, accomplished women losing the presidency to a felon, the backlash and dismissal following the “me too” movement’s pushback against sexual predators, etc etc
dnf
June 23, 2025dnf
this reads more like a list of things that happened instead of the analysis I was looking for. I already lived through all of this once, don't need to do it again
this reads more like a list of things that happened instead of the analysis I was looking for. I already lived through all of this once, don't need to do it again
June 11, 2025
As a woman who came of age during the height of the Britney/Paris/Lindsay era of media and was a big Spice Girls fan early in my life, I found this book succinctly highlighted a lot of thoughts I’ve had about feminism and culture but haven’t been able to communicate. I enjoyed that it spanned both British and North American culture and found the connections made between certain cultural events and public figures, and how they have affected society as a whole, to be logical and insightful. Girl on Girl is a must read for anyone interested in feminism and culture and how they overlap.
May 30, 2025
nothing new was presented but it’s an important read if only because all of this information is in one text. this was at times very overwhelming & even jarring but a bit all over the place. the author was trying to cover too many topics and different threads at once and the book gets away from itself and it’s presented thesis and isn’t able to delve very deeply into much of anything. it also seemed as though the author couldn’t decide if she was blaming the patriarchy for the standards and surveillance placed upon women during the 2000s or female celebrities/public figures for perpetuating the misogynistic standards they were placed under (which may have been a subconscious bias but it came through strongly). there was also actually very little exploration into how the rampant culture of misogyny specific to the 2000s impacted everyday women or how it’s long term effects have reverberated.
+ it was weird to have an entire chapter dedicated to how dangerous & exploitive the porn industry is, how porn directly contributes to the subjugation & dehumanization of women, and connecting it to the atrocities committed at abu ghraib only to end the chapter with a disclaimer tantamount to “but don’t get me wrong i love porn! porn is great!”
+ it was weird to have an entire chapter dedicated to how dangerous & exploitive the porn industry is, how porn directly contributes to the subjugation & dehumanization of women, and connecting it to the atrocities committed at abu ghraib only to end the chapter with a disclaimer tantamount to “but don’t get me wrong i love porn! porn is great!”
June 30, 2025
Ambitious, deeply researched project & largely successful overview. It does however read like a series of media studies/academic papers––the prose is dry and the structure is quite boring. I think the book's most interesting insights are consistently not Gilbert's own arguments, but the ideas she brings in from other writers' work. I really think this book would have benefited from some original reporting!
May 28, 2025
Extremely in-depth analysis on women and how they’ve been treated by the media and society in the last 30 or so years. As a millennial this hit me hard.
May 17, 2025
A very insightful reflection, especially for millennials, on the way women have been portrayed in pop culture. From reality tv to porn, politics, health & wellness, and social media, society has done it's hardest to tear down women any chance it can.
I flew through this book as Gilbert's voice is savvy, punchy, informative, and fast-paced. She navigates the reader through pop culture's many "feminist" trends and how so many moments in history were designed to tear women down. Gilbert points to many people and moments in time as stewards of anti-feminism, even if they were unaware or were used as mere props by those higher in power (Girl Power movement, Spice Girls, Madonna, early reality tv, the Kardashians, Desperate Housewives, and many more.) However, the real thread that connects it all comes to porn. The author presents the reader with endless receipts on how the porn industry has influenced pop culture and how women view themselves, even pointing out how this differentiates between white and BIPOC women.
I highly recommend this to anyone who wants an up-to-date and highly educational look on pop culture and how women are represented.
I flew through this book as Gilbert's voice is savvy, punchy, informative, and fast-paced. She navigates the reader through pop culture's many "feminist" trends and how so many moments in history were designed to tear women down. Gilbert points to many people and moments in time as stewards of anti-feminism, even if they were unaware or were used as mere props by those higher in power (Girl Power movement, Spice Girls, Madonna, early reality tv, the Kardashians, Desperate Housewives, and many more.) However, the real thread that connects it all comes to porn. The author presents the reader with endless receipts on how the porn industry has influenced pop culture and how women view themselves, even pointing out how this differentiates between white and BIPOC women.
I highly recommend this to anyone who wants an up-to-date and highly educational look on pop culture and how women are represented.
June 13, 2025
the subtitle is misleading here, I feel. I didn't expect nearly half of this book to focus on describing in great detail the graphic and violent sexual acts women have experienced in different media over the past 30 years. I also don't really know what the point of this book is? it certainly doesn't feel like any analysis or observations here revealed anything new. it feels like a much longer and more (unnecessarily) explicit think piece from the 2010s.
May 15, 2025
What I’d hoped for was a book that examined the impacts of pop-culture on the post-feminist movement through proper research. Instead, the research presented in this book is superficial at best, with the author referring to others commentary on particular movements or moments in pop-culture, their subsequent influence, followed by their own critique or observation of the initial commentary.
Also, while I don’t doubt the influence of pop-culture, film, television and porn on western societies exists (as these element will always permeate throughout and influence culture), the absence of any significant studies or evidence based research beyond others commentary and the authors self-reflection and subsequent opinion doesn’t provide an argument with a solid foundation.
I did enjoy the book overall and did come across some new learnings. However, it ultimately felt like a very superficial take on what could have been a much more in-depth and better researched book that provided more concrete evidence about its primary contention.
Also, while I don’t doubt the influence of pop-culture, film, television and porn on western societies exists (as these element will always permeate throughout and influence culture), the absence of any significant studies or evidence based research beyond others commentary and the authors self-reflection and subsequent opinion doesn’t provide an argument with a solid foundation.
I did enjoy the book overall and did come across some new learnings. However, it ultimately felt like a very superficial take on what could have been a much more in-depth and better researched book that provided more concrete evidence about its primary contention.
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