Listen, I’ll be the first to say that we’re all incredibly busy and thanks to our phones, reading feature-length stories isn’t at the top of our list of priorities. Unless you’re a media weirdo *raises hand.*
However, as editorial director of this website, I can tell you matter of factly; Girlboss published some insightful, resourceful, interrogating, and goddamn inspiring stories this year.
And since the new year is approaching, we’re in the list-writing mood. Behold: The best of Girlboss in the year 2018, garbage fire (with some redeeming moments) that it was.
Work
Diet Talk Has Absolutely No Place At Work—And It’s Time We All Stopped
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it until I’m dead; food talk has no place in the office. Let’s not bring it in to 2019, shall we? Just as with hair type and body shape, women and femmes do not need to compare each other’s work lunch. Unless it’s to ask “Where did you get that? Yum,” and then walk away. Writer Kelsey Miller gets it.
Since When Did We All Buy Into Pointless Office Jargon?
And while I’m on the subject of pointless office talk, can we ~touch base~ on work jargon? Why do we all subscribe to it so unquestioningly, and what do we get out of it? Deena Drewis investigates.
Are Open Plan Offices Helping Or Harming Our Productivity?
It seems like everyone’s into hot desking and agile, open work environments these days, but it turns out there are as many cons to sharing your space with coworkers. Namely visual noise, reports Melissa Batchelor Warnke. Show this to your HR team if they’re considering opening up the office.
Working While Mourning: A Survival Guide For The Living
Considering work and death are two inevitable realities of the human condition, we don’t really talk about working while mourning enough. This article presents a case for changing that, with Sara Spruch-Feiner sharing her own experience of loss, and looking to experts for guidance in getting through it while getting bills paid.
Walking Out And Speaking Up Are Their Own Kind Of Workplace Privilege
Writer Elizabeth Kiefer reflects on November’s Google walkout, where 20,000 employees marched against sexist workplace culture. But even with binding arbitration policies deleted, she asks, how will higher bars being set in well-known Silicon Valley corporations become the rule of thumb everywhere else?
Wellness
Selling Self-Care: The Awkward Perils Of Going Mainstream
Since self-care is not immune to the myriad of cultural and capitalist forces that be, how do we critique its misuse, while defending its importance? Kristina Headrick opens up that question, and suggests we keep the baby while losing the slimy bath water.
Egg Freezing And Efficiency: What Happens When Tech Paternalism Takes Over Your Life?
“Feel free to tell someone no one told you to freeze your eggs.” That’s what Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg told a company-wide gathering when writer Bo Ren was working there. When it comes to the “corporate benefit” of egg freezing, women are faced with an alarming paradox—the procedure’s at once a privilege and an often-coercive, precarious process. And there are no guarantees.
How To Practice Self-Care When You’re The Only PoC In The Office
The mental and emotional drain of working in an environment where you are the only person of color cannot be overstated. Between microagressions and systemic disadvantage, PoC are up against a lot. Here, Carine Lavache offers some tactical strategies for coping.
These Women Are Leading The Sex Ed Revolution Online
Sex ed at school is somewhat…lacking. Fortunately sex educators online are picking up the slack for adults—and it’s about much more than putting a banana on a condom. Writer Melissa Batchelor Warnke spoke to a handful of the women revolutionizing the sex ed space.
Self-Care 101: Where Did “Self-Care” Even Come From?
Self-care is nothing new. In fact, it’s a concept said to have been kicking around since Ancient Greece—used, and indeed misused, in countless ways ever since. This story (written by yours truly) looks at the roots of self-care, paying respect to the people—namely WoC—who helped make it a thing.
Money
How We Were All Sold The Lie That Women Are “Bad With Money”
The idea that women are somehow inherently bad at managing money has been around for too long, and we’ve kinda bought into it. In this piece, Deena Drewis makes it crystal clear that it’s time to call bullshit on the shadiest trick the patriarchy ever pulled—and offers some advice for un-learning sexist money thinking and re-forming your relationship to cash.
How The Wage Gap Impacts Latinas And What You Can Do To Help
The wage gap for all women is pretty shitty. However, out of every demographic in the US, Latinas are the most disadvantaged, earning $.54 cents for every dollar earned by white, non-Hispanic men. Associate editor of Girlboss, Theresa Avila, says there’s some things you can do to help.
For more on the urgent need for a truly inclusive discussion (and action plan) on battling pay inequality, see “This Equal Pay Day, We Need To Talk About Intersectionality” by writer Lara Witt.
Are We Thinking About Financial Independence All Wrong?
In this piece, Elizabeth Kiefer speaks to the author of the 1992 classic Your Money Or Your Life, about the notion of “financial independence” and what we, as millennials, might be getting super wrong about it.
How 3 Single Women Saved Enough To Buy Homes—With No Help
It really does feel like the only women who could ever afford to own homes have either 1) been given money from their cashed-up parents, or 2) married someone so as to double their income. But for the three people in this piece by Sara Nachlis, neither are true. Which kinda makes me reevaluate my life choices (but only a little).
How To Deal With Making More Money Than Your Parents
Feeling weird and guilty about making more money than your parents ever did? Same! That’s totally normal, as Theresa Avila writes. And as far as dealing with the complicated cocktail of emotions child-to-parent money dynamics go, she has some ideas on where to start.
Identity
The Serious Challenges Facing Native American Small Business Owners
Not only is cultural appropriation insulting and offensive, it also does direct financial harm to Indigenous communities. In this piece, designer Bethany Yellowtail talks cultural whitewashing, the importance supporting Native design, and how the law is—and isn’t—on the side of Native business owners.
Aretha Franklin’s Crown: Who’s Gonna Carry The Weight?
When legendary music icon, Aretha Franklin, died in August, writer Lynnée Denise penned an essay on the fact that Ms. Franklin’s black excellence needs to be lived to be understood. “Nobody understands Aretha like Black folks do,” Denise wrote. “Aretha’s throat was a motherland. Honey to protect it.”
The Arab Muslim Woman Who Brought Higher Education To The Entire World
Fatima Al-Fihri’s contributions can’t be overlooked. She basically invented universities. No, really. In 859 CE, Al-Fihri founded the University of Al-Qarawiyyin in Fes, Morocco. As writer Aylin Zafar says in this piece, the institution is recognized by the United Nations as the oldest existing university in the world, as well as the first to award degrees.
How I Handle My Finances: A Sex Worker’s Perspective
“People often refer to sex work as ‘easy money.’ I always respond ‘it’s not easy money, it’s fast money,’” says sex worker and writer Tilly Lawless in this essay on the reality of money-management in a women-dominated industry that’s both legally and cultural maligned.
14 Women Of Color Entrepreneurs On The Advice They Wish They had Before Getting Their Start
Writer Jessica Molina spoke to a bunch of women for this story, as diverse in experience as they are in genuine, practical advice for other women of color running their own shit. As Bethany Yellowtail (see above!) puts it, “There isn’t just one way to do anything. Activate your ingenuity. Your ancestors did a lot more with less.” True.
Life
Why Is Modern Dating So Hard—Especially For Ambitious Women?
As Elizabeth Kiefer writes in this story about being straight and single in 2018, “If Charles Dickens were writing about the heterosexual dating scene of 2018, he might dub the era we’re currently living in both the best of times and the worst of times.” Emphasis on the worst, my own.
How To Be A More Ethical Traveller—Because It Matters
This article is writer Bani Amor’s guide to how we all, as travelers, can avoid being messing with our wealth, and jerky with our colonial, Western worldview. Simply put, it’s about traveling without being a jerk about it. And hopefully, it’s make you question your approach to “haggling” (ugh) next time you take a vacation.
Only The Raddest Street Style Looks From NYC’s Girlboss Rally 2018
Girlboss editorial assistant Stephanie Stock covered one of the best parts of the most this year’s rally in NYC—the outfits—recently. And yes, the people that come to our rallies really do warrant this much attention. Just look at them! Who taught them how to be so cool, and can they teach me?
What Nobody Tells You About Giving Birth
Writer Claire Hanrahan did not hold back from sharing all the painful, poo-y details of childbirth in this piece. And considering delivering a baby is something the majority of women have done, or will do, it seems only right that we should talk about what that involves a little more in the public sphere, no? Reproductive empowerment, now.
How To Find New Friends That Are Truly On Your Level
And finally, friends. A huge part of life. But when you hustle hard as an adult (read: all of us) it can be tricky to make friends, let alone keep them. Our current editorial intern, Julia Gibson, dove into why that is—and what we can do it remedy it.
