The Karine Jean-Pierre press tour was perfect group chat fodder but I didn’t really have much to say about it until I saw Sarah Jones’ piece in New York Magazine: “Karine Jean-Pierre and the Return of the Girlboss.” In it, Jones characterizes Jean-Pierre, the former White House press secretary, as a #girlboss, which she defines as a woman whose “professional accomplishments outweigh moral considerations.” But that’s not what a Girlboss is!
Jones is not the only one to evoke the image of the Girlboss in relation to Jean-Pierre. In Becca Rothfeld’s beautifully scathing review of Jean-Pierre’s new book Independent, she calls the former press secretary an artifact of “the age of pantsuits, the word ‘empowerment,’ the musical ‘Hamilton,’ the cheap therapeutic entreaties to ‘work on yourself’ and ‘lean in’ to various corporate abysses.”
Jean-Pierre isn’t a Girlboss — in fact, calling her one is an affront to real Girlbosses who at least believed in competence and effort. Rather, she represents a post-Girlboss moment where striving has been replaced by pure performance and where one’s identity is trotted out as a ready-made shield.
Whatever your gripes with Girlboss feminism, to be a Girlboss is to steadfastly believe that hard work, professional excellence, and success could lead to gender equality. Jones’ definition ignores the Girlboss’ naked ambition as well as her pollyannaish but sincere belief that collective benefits would come from her success.
Jean-Pierre contains neither the desperate energy of the striving perfectionist nor even the pretense that her ascension should provide concrete benefits to the groups she superficially represents. Rather, she is something utterly different and unreservedly worse: Jean-Pierre is what comes after the death of the Girlboss, after the strivers have been driven underground, after a yearning for excellence has been mocked into oblivion.