Brat Politics: The Last Party Before the Fall

 

Brat Summer is Over, but Its Politics Remain

For a brief, glorious moment, 2024 was the year of Brat. TikTok was flooded with bratty, hyper-feminine, self-indulgent rebellion. Charli XCX’s Brat became the soundtrack of the summer, Sabrina Carpenter had everyone chanting "that’s that me espresso", and women online declared they were done with being agreeable.

But by the time Brat fully arrived, the world was already shifting beneath its feet. Trump loomed over American politics once again. The UK’s cost of living crisis worsened. Nightlife was in decline. The far right was gaining power.

Now, as 2025 unfolds, Brat already feels like a relic of a different time. Was Brat Summer the last hoorah before an era of austerity, repression, and conservative backlash? And if so, what does that say about its politics?

Final Party Before the Storm

Cultural excess has always flourished in the moments before economic and political collapse. The Roaring Twenties came before the Great Depression. The Y2K pop princess era preceded 9/11 and the War on Terror. The hyper-consumption of the late 2000s, with WAGs, MySpace scene queens and early 2010s Tumblr excess, collapsed into the 2008 financial crash. Now, Brat Summer of 2024-25 feels like yet another moment of indulgence on the edge of a crisis.

Brat emerged in a world where young people were getting poorer but still holding onto the fantasy of excess. It was fun, unserious and self-indulgent, not because things were good, but because deep down, everyone knew the fun wouldn’t last.

This pattern has happened before. The 1960s and 70s were full of counterculture, free love and radical leftist movements, but this era ended with the rise of Ronald Reagan, neoliberalism and the Christian Right. The late 1990s and early 2000s saw an explosion of hyper-consumerist, ultra-feminine excess, but this faded after 9/11 and the Bush-era crackdown on social freedoms. In the early 2010s, Tumblr feminism and progressive online activism flourished, but by 2016, it had triggered a backlash that helped elect Donald Trump.

Each of these moments of cultural rebellion felt like progressive victories at the time, but in reality, they were warning signs that a reactionary wave was about to follow. If Brat was the final party before the collapse, then Trump’s return in may be the inevitable backlash.

Brat as a Response to Political Exhaustion

For years, feminism was about striving. It was about girlbossing, activism and taking things seriously. Brat was the rejection of all of that.

After a decade of performative empowerment and exhausting discourse cycles, young women were tired. Tired of ethical consumption, tired of constantly debating their own humanity, tired of respectability politics. Brat was the logical next step, a rejection of moral responsibility in favour of aestheticised selfishness.

If the girlboss wanted to be taken seriously, the Brat girl didn’t care. If the Clean Girl represented discipline and wellness, Brat was about indulgence and chaos.

But was Brat actually disruptive, or just another way to package feminine rebellion into something consumable?

Brat, Class and the Illusion of Power

Who really got to be a brat? The aesthetic was rooted in materialism and excess – Juicy Couture tracksuits, designer handbags and "trophy wife" energy. But how does that work in a world where most young people can’t afford rent? Historically, working-class women have always been called ‘bratty’ when they refuse to be polite. The same behaviour that was demonised in Vicky Pollard or ‘chav’ culture is now rebranded as aspirational when it’s rich girls doing it. Brat wasn’t just about rebellion, it was about playing rich, even if you weren’t. It was the ultimate wealth fantasy, the dream of being hot, selfish and carefree in a world that increasingly demands struggle. But more than that, Brat was the last moment where people could pretend everything was fine. It was the final chance to escape into an aesthetic, to delude yourself into believing you were that girl, that you could afford to be reckless, that life was still fun. It was a collective fantasy that, for one summer, let people dress up as the version of themselves they might have been in a different world, a world where the economy wasn’t collapsing, where the right wasn’t winning, where the future wasn’t so bleak. Now, with everything getting worse, that kind of escapism isn’t sustainable anymore. At a certain point, you can’t keep pretending to slay when you can’t afford to live.

Brat, Drugs and the Aestheticisation of Self-Destruction

Every era of rebellion has its drug culture, and Brat was no different. Brat’s indulgence was never just about fun, it was about ignoring reality while it was still possible to do so. Some critics argued that Brat romanticised self-destruction in the same way heroin chic did in the 90s, or how early-2010s Tumblr aestheticised depression. The Brat girl didn’t just party; she did it with effortless, careless glamour.
This isn’t happening in isolation. Cocaine use is surging again, particularly among young women in cities, mirroring past economic booms and busts. The yuppie cokehead of the 80s reflected extreme wealth inequality under Reagan and Thatcher, just as today’s coke resurgence reflects widening class divides and a burnout economy. It makes sense that coke, a drug associated with confidence, speed, and indulgence, became linked to Brat, an aesthetic built on excess, self-interest, and playing rich even when you aren’t.
Coke’s popularity alongside Brat also follows a larger trend in how drug culture shifts with the economy. The hedonistic Wall Street coke era of the 80s came before the 90s recession. The 2000s club coke boom crashed after the 2008 financial crisis. If history repeats itself, this current wave of coke-fuelled escapism could be the final party before the collapse.

Kamala is Brat: The Memeification of Politics

When Charli XCX tweeted "Kamala is Brat", it was a joke..  but also, wasn’t? Kamala Harris, with her viral awkward laughs, coconut tree remix and quoteable viral clips embodies a different kind of Brat energy. She is unserious, self-serving, unbothered. She is Brat in the way Hillary Clinton was Girlboss.
This moment was part of a larger shift. Gen Z increasingly processes politics through vibes and aesthetics rather than policy. Kamala isn’t respected or admired as Brat, she is read as Brat, a reflection of how detached political figures feel from reality. Politics has always been about branding, but in the Brat era, it has become something else entirely; a meme economy where figures like Kamala Harris are treated less like leaders and more like TikTok archetypes.

The Decline of UK Nightlife and the Death of Brat Before It Fully Lived

Brat was a club aesthetic, but nightlife is dying. Half of the UK’s clubs have closed since 2005, and in 2023 alone, 30% of UK clubs shut down. Rising rents, police crackdowns and financial struggles have made clubbing less accessible. At the same time, young people are drinking less, going out less and spending less. The Brat girl’s lifestyle was built on clubbing and excess, but how does Brat survive in a country where nightlife is disappearing? If every era of feminine rebellion is shaped by its environment, Brat may be the first aesthetic to die before it ever fully lived.

Brat might have felt like a fun, rebellious moment, but in hindsight, it looks like the last gasp before the storm. If Trump does win, Brat will go down in history as the last cultural movement before a new, more repressive era. The final party before the lights go out.