Sometimes you want something really serious that makes you feel emotional and makes you think, and sometimes you do just want a pop song. What I love about Taylor Swift is that she offers both. – Tavi Gevinson
I feel like now fashion is just part of how I think about everything. When I send out a mood board to our contributors every month about our monthly theme, there are photos from our fashion shows, but there are also film stills and album art. – Tavi Gevinson
Feminism to me means fighting. It’s a very nuanced, complex thing, but at the very core of it I’m a feminist because I don’t think being a girl limits me in any way. – Tavi Gevinson
As feminism becomes more integrated into mainstream publications and conversation, I feel weary of an obsession of celebrity culture masquerading as activism or as conversation or action. It’s clickbait. – Tavi Gevinson
People don’t know what to do when writing a story with teens that takes place now – they think you have to make a bunch of references to Facebook. – Tavi Gevinson
I no longer get into stupid thought wormholes about identity and stuff. At one time, I did have some impostor syndrome about acting, but then I remembered I’ve been doing this since I was little, actually. – Tavi Gevinson
That young people don’t have valid thoughts about the world because they haven’t been alive long enough is sadly a very popular and, frankly, unoriginal sentiment. When I think about that time, I was just responding to the world around me. – Tavi Gevinson
I think that everybody wants to be heard, and the easiest way to be the loudest is to be the hater. – Tavi Gevinson
I feel like one thing that a lot of creative people go through is that they feel like they don’t have the right to be creative or to put their stuff out there. I’m glad that blogging from a young age kind of got that out of the way for me. – Tavi Gevinson
My anxiety has gotten worse as I’ve graduated and gotten older, and I still feel like ‘Rookie’ is a place where I can talk about that, and hopefully someone relates to it. – Tavi Gevinson
I am a feminist – I just think the label reflects my beliefs – but, you know, we say ‘Rookie’ is a website for teenage girls, not a feminist website for teenage girls. That’s not because I’m not proud to call myself a feminist, but when you’re calling attention to a project, you can very easily be pigeonholed by choosing certain identifiers. – Tavi Gevinson
The connection that readers have to ‘Rookie’ has only meant more and more to me as I get older. – Tavi Gevinson
I actually never liked writing on my own or in school until I’d had my blog for a while and realized I’d been writing every day for years. – Tavi Gevinson
I feel like, maybe in the ’90s, ‘Rookie’ would have been shamed for trying to reach a lot of people or trying to be ‘mainstream’, but I’m so pleased that our readers are happy to see me promoting the ‘Rookie’ yearbook on TV or whatever. – Tavi Gevinson
There are moments when I am really not happy with how I look, or I think it would be an easy way out to try and do the conventionally attractive thing. But part of it is that I don’t have the energy to put on, like, makeup. If people want to do that, that’s fine. But I’ve learned that it’s not for me. – Tavi Gevinson
I think it’s foolish to interview someone who’s just promoting a movie that they’re in and ask if they consider themselves a feminist. That’s not about feminism; that’s about the journalist wanting to gauge how much this person is aware of the world or is aware of the feminist movement. – Tavi Gevinson
Sometimes if you expose your vulnerability, someone else will feel comforted. It’s like we’re all in this boat together. – Tavi Gevinson
Fashion intersects a lot with art and film and music, and that was appealing to me. I read a bunch of fashion blogs and wanted to be part of the community. – Tavi Gevinson
I’m a big journaler, so for every new journal, I would change the way my room looked and change the posters on the walls, and I would change what I was wearing, and I would have a playlist, and it all kind of corresponded and matched, and I would change my handwriting in the journals. – Tavi Gevinson
Half of my closet is Barbie clothes – PVC skirts, cropped fuzzy sweaters, and velvet minis. – Tavi Gevinson
The idea of being a ‘child star’ always sounded awful to people my age, and so I was just very aware that these things are kind of fleeting and that a lot of it didn’t have to do with me: it had to do with my age; it had to do with whatever came to mind when people thought of a young internet sensation. – Tavi Gevinson
I think I surprise some people because a lot of the time, I roll out of bed and go to school, and it’s like I don’t wear anything that interesting sometimes. – Tavi Gevinson
I think it was my mom’s attitude about art and being part of the narcissistic digital generation or whatever that made me think anyone would care what I had to say about anything! – Tavi Gevinson
It brings me no joy and not enough comfort to dwell too much on things I’ve said or written or made or worn in the past. – Tavi Gevinson
What feels most productive to me isn’t to think so much in terms of how I can be alternative, but how I can be subversive in a way that feels organic, how I can connect with people, and how I can just be myself, which may be the hardest thing to be. – Tavi Gevinson
I feel lucky in that I don’t really have to go to college to study something job-specific. I just want to go to learn about what is interesting to me and learn about the classes that you don’t really get to take in high school because you have to take the basics. – Tavi Gevinson
I am a Justin Bieber fan, but I am also so fascinated by how weird pop music can be and how manipulated it can be, so I enjoy thinking about that side of it too. I feel bad for him. I could never imagine growing up that way. – Tavi Gevinson
I think that when people who’ve had success from a young age go through a train-wreck cycle, it’s usually because they’re working on someone else’s terms, so they feel the need to rebel. But when it’s something you’ve built, you don’t have that same kind of resentment or angstiness. But it’s also difficult to keep those standards for yourself. – Tavi Gevinson
When I feel really insecure, or I’m in a social situation where I’m nervous about how I come off, or I’m trying to control the situation too much, I literally just try and use the same muscles that I had to use on stage – just paying attention to the other person and trusting yourself to respond as emotionally honestly as possible. – Tavi Gevinson
