Question for the Culture: When Did We All Become Demure Brats?

Let’s set the record straight- are you really a 365 party girl, or is it the 24-7 assault and allure of social media? 

With the lifecycle and impact of trends drastically shortened, this breakneck pace now effects every facet of culture- from politics to pop culture to fashion and design. This week, I must have heard “very demure, very mindful” repeated over a thousand time. If I’m being honest, this is likely a gross underestimation, as we are largely unaware of how much information our brains receive in a single scroll sesh.  Homogenization of ideas and aesthetics often comes in a barrage of sound bites. The rapid succession of trends, and the inevitable backlash against them, is a phenomenon our collective psychological burnout.

(Left to right- Julia Fox via @iancharms Instagram, Gabriette & Addison Rae)

On June 7 2024, Charli XCX’s dropped her 6th studio album Brat. The sound within is a bold exploration of rebellious femininity, merging themes of empowerment, self-expression, and defiance. Featuring high-profile collaborations with artists like Julia Fox, Gabriette, Addison Rae, Lorde, and Billie Eilish- Brat was a breath of fresh air, quickly followed by a drag of green apple vape pen. As an elder millennial, I remember living through the mid-10s club scene in NYC, the rise and fall of indie sleaze, Tumblr and the launch of Instagram in my early twenties. As the iPhone gradually out paced BlackBerry, we all naively downloaded an app similarly outpacing Facebook. Instagram launched in the fall of 2010, with my first post dated March 12th, 2012. I’m pictured whiplash dancing at the Jane Hotel, very fitting. As parents infiltrated Facebook, young millennials began their exodus to IG. In these days, trend cycles lasted 2-5 years and the term lifestyle brand was in it's infancy.

(Archives from personal instagram 2012-2014)

Back then photos were grainy, people still smoked cigarettes unironically and we all lived a little more freely. Straddling the analog world and internet boom, millennials (like Charli) hold a unique perceptive unlike any before or after us. This POV has left me feeling more protective than resentful of younger generations. As such, visual nostalgia for this era feels less forced than examples predating smart phones, especially when thoughtfully executed. Brat seized the summer by addressing a collective urning for a time when digital voyeurism felt low stakes, and hedonism ran rampant.

(Charli XCX on Brat Press Tour)

Despite capturing the irreverent mindset of mid-10s party antics, marketing for Brat followed a very modern playbook. Charli’s team leveraged influencer culture to create a visual world built for synergistic cross promotion. Brat is a spectacle of punchy color theory, edgy fashion and provocative lyrics set to a hyper pop beat. As she explained in a recent interview:

"I wanted Brat to feel like a movement, something that people could wear, live, and breathe." -Charli XCX

Just as quickly as "Brat Summer" arrived, it was challenged by a starkly contrasting trend: "Very Demure, Very Mindful." This new aesthetic, characterized by soft pastels, modest silhouettes, and a focus on wellness and introspection, was a direct reaction to the flamboyance of its predecessor. The shift was jarring, yet unsurprising, as online culture seems increasingly prone to these rapid, pendulum swings. The “very demure, very mindful" soundbite created by Jools Lebron, took off rapidly in the month of August 2024. As quickly as the phrase bubbled out of the internet into the real world, it will soon die on the vine. The legacy of Brat will live long beyond this particular meme-cycle, but that doesn't make the reaction less noteworthy.  

Yin and yang trends are not anomalies, but rather part of a broader pattern in online discourse. We’ve seen this play out before with the likes of "clean girl" aesthetic—minimalist, polished, and effortless—giving way to "mob wife", which embraced bold, exaggerated glamour with a nod to hyperfemininity. Staying relevant in a chronically online world leads to psychological burnout. When trends becomes ubiquitous, expect an abrupt pivot.

The phenomenon of cultural fatigue is evident in the fashion industry, where micro-trends—often born and spread on platforms like Pinterest, TikTok and Instagram—rise and fall with alarming speed. The result is a glut of products and clothing no one asked for, contributing to environmental damage and a pervasive sense of dissatisfaction. As a result, the normalization and trendification of thrifting, vintage shopping, and second-hand goods are a direct response to the disposable commodification of virality.

These online and economic trends draw a through-line to the binary nature of American politics. Just as we see in fashion and culture, political discourse has become increasingly polarized, with little room for nuance. Cyclical transfer of power from right to left, left to right every 4 to 8 years due to chronic dissatisfaction mirrors the rise and fall of such fades. The result is a political and social landscape where sound bites and sensationalism often overshadow meaningful dialogue or quality product. After much (minimal) reflection on how to conclude this deep (shallow) dialogue, it felt timely (dystopian) to leave you with a joke (mockery) written by Chat GPT:

Why did the smartphone go to therapy?

Because it had so many connections, and still felt disconnected 📱☹️