We werent allowed feminism we had the Spice Girls: the two comics unpicking ladette culture – The Guardian

When Shaparak Khorsandis teenage son recently discovered 90s music the Shamens Ebeneezer Good, Pulp and more he had questions for her. What did Jarvis Cocker mean when he sang I seem to have left an important part of my brain somewhere, somewhere in a field in Hampshire? Were they singing about ecstasy? Did she go raving, too?

Khorsandi was in her teens and 20s in the 1990s, and being swept along in ladette culture. Used by the lads mag FHM as early as 1994, ladette came to describe bolshie women who could out-party and out-gross any hardened lad. Sara Cox, Denise van Outen and Zoe Ball were the media favourites: often pictured binge-drinking and out on the town. Ladettes went hand-in-hand with 90s lad culture, where Britpop, banter and sport collided in a blizzard of hedonism. These new lads, posited one researcher, were retreating into a more simplistic masculinity in response to the Spice Girls concept of Girl Power; and middle-class boys were co-opting the dress and behaviours of working-class men.

Writing her latest show, It Was the 90s!, for the Edinburgh fringe last summer, Khorsandi reflected on the decade. Weve glossed over ladette culture a bit; its been fun to revisit it, she says. It was initially meant to be a feminist action. We thought we were taking power back by making ourselves very ill with booze and selling ourselves short when we went out. The men do it, so should we! But what we didnt have, which my sons generation has, was the notion of self-care.

It Was the 90s! delves into Khorsandis time as a ladette and how attitudes have changed. What do we dismiss under the guise of nostalgia? Was the pressure to go out every night, drink until you were sick, and separate sex from emotions really as good as she thought at the time? Khorsandi explores it all. The way I deal with bad times is to make them funny and this is the most fun show Ive done, she says. This is an honest conversation between 23-year-old me and 48-year-old me.

Khorsandi started out in comedy in the 90s. Standup then was the closest thing I had to punk. We just drank until some kind of career happened or you died. There were no other women that I worked with, and it was all about being as hard and as gross as you could.

Esther Manito has also been looking back on 90s ladette culture in her show #NotAllMen, which won the Leicester comedy festivals best show award in 2021. She comes on stage to Robin Thickes Blurred Lines and opens with: Do we have any violent misogynists in? Growing up, Manito would spend summer holidays in Beirut. Friends would ask: was it safe? In reality, her happy experiences in Lebanon stood in stark contrast to simply walking home from school in Essex, where she faced catcalls almost daily. The female empowerment she was fed through pop culture back then was incredibly lacking. We werent allowed feminism in the 90s, Manito jokes in her show. We had the Spice Girls.

During the pandemic, living with her Lebanese father, British husband and son, Manito began to explore masculinity and how its expectations can damage men. She spoke to old school friends about the way lockdown pushed many couples into stereotypical gender roles. One friend found a list Manito had written as a teenager, detailing the qualities of her dream boyfriend, including: Must not touch me with the light on.

That projection of what a womans body was through lads magazines meant I was really self-conscious, Manito says. She had grown up in a progressive, feminist household, so the pressure to conform felt doubly bad. I thought: Im not this hairless, skinny, big-titted, oiled-up figure, and I dont want to be.

She recalls a column where Zoo magazines agony uncle Danny Dyer suggested a man whod split with his girlfriend should cut your exs face so no one else would date her. (He later claimed he was misquoted.) Such flagrant misogyny, she thought, must affect how boys and men interacted with women. Looking at my husband and others, I think it took them a really long time to be able to have relationships with women that werent sexual, she says. While some of this was shocking to look back on, you find humour in the bizarre, she says.

Both Manito and Khorsandi recall being labelled shouty or fiery after voicing their opinions. Khorsandi cultivated a posh accent because she was made to feel like I couldnt be brown and working class. She shortened her name to Shappi because I was so ashamed every time anyone said Shaparak out loud because thered be titters of laughter. This is the first full tour shes performing as Shaparak. Khorsandi received an ADHD diagnosis earlier this year another prompt for reflection. Was it partly her undiagnosed ADHD that drew her into ladette behaviour? Looking back, the booze medicated my ADHD, she says. I think not understanding about self-care and neurodivergence played into the 90s binge-drinking culture.

Looking back has made them both appreciate where society is today. I definitely dont feel nostalgia for the 90s! Manito says.

I dont want to be stuck in my youth, says Khorsandi. Ive watched how things have changed my standup and values have changed. Comedy is part of culture it all moves forward.

Both women have noticed a refreshing acceptance among their childrens generation. Theres no othering, Manito says. Ive never heard my boy say: Girls cant do that, something I always heard growing up. I think my kids will face fewer hurdles when it comes to creating connections with people.

The tolerance they have for one another is astounding, Khorsandi agrees. It doesnt occur to my sons generation to be negative about someone who is transitioning or non-binary. I had to explain to my children that ginger people used to get teased at school. They looked at me like: Are you mad?! Things have really changed.

Shaparak Khorsandis It Was the 90s! tour resumes 21 January at Otley Courthouse; Esther Manito is at the Beck theatre, Hayes, Friday 7 January, and performs #NotAllMen at the Glee Club, Birmingham, 22 April

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We werent allowed feminism we had the Spice Girls: the two comics unpicking ladette culture - The Guardian