In Defense of the VSCO Girl
My experience with VSCO girls comes twofold. I’ve had the VSCO app downloaded on my phone since eighth grade as a way to edit photos, albeit poorly. That was before VSCO blew up, and I remember most of the photos on my feed were either amateur landscape shots or casual photos of friends. Now VSCO has a very distinct vibe to it, and I’ve seen firsthand how it’s changed over the last couple of years. The whole “VSCO girl” trend is based on a very specific and aspirational lifestyle captured by heavily edited photos posted on VSCO. These photos often have to do with casual drinking, parties, relationships, and an overall California summer aesthetic all year long.
If you could summarize the classic VSCO girl lifestyle in three words, they would be breezy, lively, and trendy. Of course, there are other photos posted on VSCO that focus more on photographic composition and others that are meant to share no more than moments with friends and interesting locations. However, VSCO has increasingly become a medium where this aspirational way of life has influenced teenage girls to live out the pictures published on the app. It’s safe to say that the VSCO girl trend is in full swing in youth culture, and with that comes scrutiny from others.
The second incarnation of the VSCO girl came to me via the app TikTok. TikTok is the world’s fastest-growing social media platform, so it goes without saying that it’s become a huge part of mainstream media. People either love it or hate it, but everyone knows what TikTok is. I downloaded the app a couple of months ago, with no real expectation that I would enjoy it as much as Instagram or Snapchat. I’ll admit, though, that TikTok is now the first app I open during my study breaks or right before I go to bed (for which my friends often make fun of me). If you’re not familiar, TikTok is an app where people share short videos, and its trends often dictate and inspire pop culture and everyday banter for teenagers. This is where VSCO and TikTok intersect, because the VSCO girl trend recently had its own moment on TikTok, and not for a good reason. TikTok often makes or adopts trends, then proceeds to crap all over it a couple of weeks later once it’s decidedly not cool anymore.
A lot of creators on TikTok followed the “VSCO girl” trends, i.e. oversized t-shirts and puka shell necklaces, and once the general public picked up on this, the VSCO girl memes began. I’ve seen countless TikTok videos poking fun at VSCO girls, and they all usually have the same formula: scrunchies, a Hydroflask, and the phrase “sksksksk.” Although some of these are quite funny, they are also, for the most part, problematic.
The meme has gotten well past the point of making fun of these girls, so I just want to play a little devil’s advocate for all of the VSCO girl haters out there. Believe me, I used to be one of them; I didn’t think twice every time I judged someone at school based on their seemingly “VSCO girl” outfit. It wasn’t until I watched Tiffany Ferg’s YouTube video called “VSCO Girls, E-Girls, & Tik Tok,” where she explains the unfair scrutiny of teen girl culture, that I realized I should try to become more self-aware of how I think about these girls. I’m sure everyone remembers that in middle school, the “basic white girl” ideal was a combination of Ugg boots, leggings, and ombre hair. I personally picked up on this trend, buying fur boots and begging my mom to dye my hair, while simultaneously making fun of and disparaging “basic girls.” Here, I was both the follower and critic, unwittingly contributing to a culture of hating on teenage girls despite being one myself. Making fun of something popular because it’s cool isn’t a new concept, and its effect on teen girls is one of its most insidious forms. Whether it's with the Ugg boots of the early 2010s, or the scrunchies and Hydroflasks of today, teen girls have always been ridiculed—first by teenage boys and grown men, and then, reactionarily, by themselves.
All teenagers go through multiple phases and self-discovery as they grow up, and girls in particular have to do this under the watchful eye of a patriarchal society. There’s a misogyny that comes to teenager girl culture, when society feels entitled to criticize how these young girls dress and act. These girls then try to disassociate themselves from pop culture to avoid criticism, and in order to regain control and dignity, internalize the sexism to divert the attention away from them. This leads to the common utterance “I’m not like other girls,” a textbook example of internalized sexism. Although most of this criticism is subversive and not necessarily very harmful in the long run, it does contribute to a misogynistic distaste of young girls, stemming from a need to control and facilitate what these girls do and how they look.
Trying to fit in isn’t a crime, and though it might err on the side of inauthenticity, it’s not sufficient reason to criticize a whole demographic of people. VSCO girls aren’t anything new, as Tiffany Ferg puts it, they’re just a reincarnation of the Tumblr girls we wanted to be when we were in elementary school. The trendy versus anti-trendy girl fight will persist as long as teenagers exist, so as long as it does, it’s worthwhile to consider what making fun of them contributes to the subtle misogyny present in pop culture and young adult society. At the end of the day, adolescence is pertinent to a person’s development emotionally as well as physically, and we should encourage their self-actualization no matter what our opinions may be.
by HANNAH KIM