VSCO girl

Since launching in 2011, the app VSCO (formerly VSCO cam) has allowed users to edit photos and videos with preset filters and other tools, which they then share on the app itself or on other social media, such as Instagram.

We can find the phrase VSCO girl in 2017–2018. Some of these instances apply the term to describe a young woman who is a loyal user of the app. Other instances use VSCO girl, likely with an ironic tone, for a young, white woman who posts perfectly—and enviably—attractive pictures online. (The phrase calls up similar constructions like Tumblr girl, e-girl, and Tinderella, as well as Valley girl and preppy girl before them.)

This latter use of VSCO girl anticipates how the term evolved in 2019. In January 2019, YouTube user Greer Jones posted a satirical video in which she explained how to become “the ultimate VSCO girl.” This included trying to become famous or go viral by posting a lot of pictures involving designer clothes (e.g., Nike Air Force 1 shoes and Lululemon athleisure wear) and lifestyle trends (drinking coffee with oat milk).

By summer 2019, the term VSCO girl spread as a slang insult online as more social videos on YouTube, TikTok, and other platforms stereotyped her as an obsessively trendy, vain young woman. VSCO itself praised, perhaps ironically, one mocking “VSCO girl transformation” video, posted in June 2019 and since earning over 1.5 million views. The first Urban Dictionary entry for VSCO girl was published in July 2019, and articles on several popular websites were considering the term and trend by August.

Trends especially mocked center on a beach-y, 1990s aesthetic popular in the 2010s, including scrunchies, the color yellow, friendship bracelets, high-waisted jean shorts, baggy tie-dye tops, Birkenstock sandals. Lifestyle trends include health fads, using eco-friendly products, drinking out of Hydro Flask water canisters, using disposable cameras, and taking pictures of hangouts with friends in coyly free-spirited poses.

The terms sksksk and I oop are also associated with the stereotypical VSCO girl. The former is meant as an expression of excitement or awkwardness, the latter a playful way to acknowledge a mistake. Both of these expressions, however, have been traced back to Black female, drag, and/or LGBTQ communities.

sksksksanoopanoop sksksks and i oop anoop anioop scrunchie girl hydroflask vsco girl white tiktok pic.twitter.com/FszhmNstlt

— reaction videos (@findurmeme) August 10, 2019

The underlying implication of the insult VSCO girl is that she is white, relatively rich, conformist, and obsessed with social media—that’s she’s basic, to use another slang term, but according to the perceived fashion and lifestyle trends among young, white women in the late 2010s.