I’m not exaggerating when I say Sex and the City has carried me through adulthood. I watched it for the first time as a doe-eyed, single college girl living on her own for the first time. The second time, navigating (and failing) through my first relationship. The third, as a married woman building a career in journalism.
Each viewing hit completely differently, and I firmly believe that the show has a lesson for just about every romantic, platonic, and personal problem one could experience.
Maybe you just snapped at a best friend that her situationship isn’t good for her.
Or you’re reeling from a hangover after one too many Long Island iced teas.
Perhaps you’ve never felt more comfortable in your body.
Or maybe you’re just a girl yearning to find that huge, inconvenient, can’t-live-without-each-other love.
The show, which debuted over 25 years ago, strikes a chord with millions of fans, past and present. But over the course of the last decade or so, something peculiar has caused a shift in its perception. As it turns out, a lot of people hate Carrie Bradshaw, the show’s protagonist. In the early 2000s, she was the it-girl. The muse. The fashion icon. Today, commenters reduce her unapologetic yearning to being “cringe.”
For every bit of social commentary I see about Carrie Bradshaw, it seems 75% of commenters ruthlessly obliterate her character to Chanel-infused smithereens.
To name a few sprinkled across TikTok and X:
“She was an awful person and she never really grew or evolved as a character."
“Carrie was annoying af. All the other girls secured the bag and did it by hustling!!!She wrote 2 paragraphs [per] week and slept with Big without any promise of marriage."
“Growing up is realizing Carrie is the villain."
“Carrie Bradshaw and her friends taught women to play games instead of having honest conversations."
In summary of the more common critiques, she’s a narcissistic, desperate, whiny over-spender who took advantage of everyone in her life.
Ouch.
In all fairness, yes, Carrie has made some questionable choices.
But I couldn’t help but wonder…is the Carrie Bradshaw criticism warranted, or is it just a reflection of everything we want to distance ourselves from in real life?
Stepping Into Carrie's Shoes
If you haven’t tuned in, SATC follows Carrie Bradshaw, a thirty-something single woman navigating work and dating in New York City alongside her three best friends, Miranda, Samantha, and Charlotte. Her closet alone deserves its own MoMA exhibit, and you’ll never catch her in flats. She writes a cheeky newspaper column about sex, eventually going on to make $4 a word at Vogue and publish books herself.
Throughout the series, Carrie proves to be a beautifully messy romantic on an eternal quest to find her great love and some Manolo Blahniks to match.
She’s extremely loyal to her friends, rarely misses a deadline, and always looks impeccable for someone who’s never seen at a Pilates class. Sure, along the way she’s flaked on said friends, cheated on her boyfriend, and dwindled her savings to buy an amazing outfit.
The girl is full of contradictions, but aren’t we all?
Calling out her major flaws—bad money management, dramatic love affairs, occasional violations of girl code, and an inability to keep plants alive—could easily describe almost any woman ever. And that’s exactly why she feels so human.
So why all the hate?
Looking deeper, it appears that her desire to love and be loved seems to be the root from which all of her critiques stem. Openly desiring love is a trait that is so rarely flaunted these days, it’s a little hard to watch.
It's Simple: She’s A Mirror Of Ourselves
If you peruse the comment section of any Sex and the City-driven content, you’ll probably find multiple women dragging Carrie through the mud for either being a horrible friend or a desperate girlfriend.
In a reposted clip of the Sex and the City movie, when Carrie points out that she and Mr. Big stayed in two nights the previous week instead of going out for dinner, women flocked to the comments to say things like “If my husband wanted to stay in with me, I’d be glad!” or “All her husband wants to do is put his feet up after a long day. Why does she have to nag so much?"
Hating on Carrie doesn’t make you smarter, more attractive, or more likely to gain approval from the opposite sex.
It’s the consensus that women want to be treated well, have a solid friend group, and look good doing it!
The modern critiques of Carrie come from recognizing, at least subconsciously, the uncomfortable pieces of ourselves in her. Who hasn’t spent too much on clothing hauls or been unable to buy their apartment building or overhauled conversation to dissect a bad breakup for the hundredth time?
Yes, Carrie has her selfish moments, but the only reason we feel entitled to pick at them is because they’re front and center for us to. (Or, to take it even further, we're too afraid to be seen, so we live through the experiences of someone else.) If our intimate moments were on display for an audience, don’t you think there’d be much to discuss there as well?
Ugh, she doesn't respond in the group chat enough. What a horrible friend.
She drinks too many Cosmopolitans/espresso martinis/margaritas. Trashy.
Another iced latte this week but penny-pinching for the electric bill? Loser!
Surely the content creators who are vulnerable online know what this feels like.
The modern dissection of Carrie Bradshaw makes me less likely to agree and more likely to wonder why we’re so quick to laugh at other women who yearn, are messy, and make mistakes, especially when they’re so blatantly relatable.
If we call out another woman’s flaws publicly, we’re saying to the world, “I would never do this.” By calling out her spending habits, you’re sending the message that your finances are perfect. Leaving a comment about how she’s horrible to her friends means you’ve never left a text unanswered or bailed on plans. Judging her for cheating on a partner with a married man and breaking the poor wife's tooth...ok, you're right, this one's bad.
We could be talking about Carrie or any woman on the internet.
Ridiculing another woman comes off as, let's face it, pick-me, especially when her biggest crime, according to the internet, is desperately wanting to find love.