Women don’t owe you pretty.

It’s a sentence that’s so true we want to hang it in neon on the wall, add to our morning affirmations and scream it at any troll who has the audacity. 

It’s also the title of Florence Given’s debut bestselling book. Released by the illustrator and author in 2020, the hit book has quickly become a bible for women across the world on self-esteem, body image, internalised misogyny, slut-shaming and more, all explored through the lens of intersectional feminism.

 

 

Women Don’t Owe You Pretty  sold more than 100,000 copies in its first six months of release alone, became an Amazon number one bestseller, and made the prestigious Sunday Times' bestsellers list for a staggering twelve consecutive weeks.

 In topping the charts, Florence Given well and truly made feminist writing mainstream - and with it pushed the needle on equality across the world.

Oh, and she was just 21 years old when the book was published. Now, that ‘s pretty badass.

 

"Crumbs can't feed me.

I want the cake."

 

 

Intersectional influence

To get into someone’s mind, you’ve gotta get into their Instagram feed. Or, at least, that’s how Florence has spread her activism.

 

With more than 600,00 followers and a signature stylised art style we just can’t get enough of, combined with slogans which spread messages of the social issues around sexuality, Given has made the message of intersectional feminism more shareable than ever before.

 

For the Gen-Z activist, having a huge social media following means using it to spread equality and challenge the status quo.

 

Empowering and educating

Florence has been super influential in educating people everywhere about the nuances of intersectional feminism - and offering advice to those that need it too. In fact, fans have even praised her book for shining a light on rape culture, gaslighting and with giving them the courage to leave abusive relationships.

 

Though Women Don’t Owe You Pretty attracted controversy by drawing comparisons to and inspiration from Chidera Eggerue’s similarly-designed modern feminist books What A Time to Be Alone and How to Get Over a Boy we can firmly say we’re fans of all the titles: Discovering one is the perfect entry to the other works which have inspired it.

 

Florence has saidthat the aim of the book is to help women “demand a new level of love for themselves,” and to "hopefully poke some holes” in the old patriarchal ideas that women "need men, their validation and the products they sell to us to make us look ‘better’.”

 

 

Beyond social

Florence has taken her social influence and taken it beyond Instagram, to create real-world society changes. Case in point? Take her petition to cancel the Netflix show Insatiable, for example, for its body-shaming themes, which drew more than 100,000 signatures.

 

As Florence said of the petition, “The toxicity of this series is bigger than just this one particular series… This is not an isolated case, but part of a much larger problem that I can promise you every single woman has faced in her life: sitting somewhere on the scale of valuing their worth on their bodies, to be desirable objects for the male gaze. That is exactly what this series does.”

"Life is too short not to love the sh*t out of yourself" 

 

If you’re not already following Florence on Instagram (@florencegiven), do it now and consider that step one to improving your badassery today - and get ready to share a ton of her posts to your stories.

 

Delivering daily inspo for the wellbeing of womankind, and empowering millions of women around the globe to embrace womanhood, sexuality, self-confidence? That sounds like a living legend to us.