By Naomi Foster

If you have spent any time on a certain side of TikTok, you have likely come across the recurring joke that “young hoes cook everything on high.” The phrase, often paired with an older Black woman’s looping audio of disbelief, began as criticism but quickly evolved into something else entirely. Young women recognized themselves in it. What began as a man’s remark, intended as criticism, has since been reworked by young women themselves. In adopting the word “hoe,” a term long used to shame and discipline female behavior, they transform insult into self-description, signaling recognition rather than embarrassment. What appears at first to be a trend about carelessness is instead a collective reframing of womanhood, one rooted in efficiency, autonomy, and refusal. This is not feminism as resistance. It is feminism as self-orientation.

What might appear, at first glance, to be a trend about laziness or carelessness has, instead, become a collective reframing of how young women live. This is not feminism as resistance. It is feminism as self-orientation.

Who Is the “Young Ho”?

The “young ho” is best understood as a generational and cultural figure. She is most often a Gen Z woman, roughly between the ages of 18 and 29, with the cultural core of the trend centering around women in their early to mid twenties. The language itself signals this positioning. Much like the term “YN,” meaning young n***a, “young ho” is not racially neutral. Even when it is performed by white women, it remains a term rooted in Black vernacular, Black humor, and Black cultural context. We instinctively know who the term refers to, and just as importantly, who it does not.

The young ho is not reckless. She is overextended.

She is a woman living under social, economic, and emotional pressure, navigating school, work, relationships, and independence often all at once. The behaviors associated with the young ho are not random acts of chaos but visible responses to that pressure.

Young Men have always eaten poorly, rushed through tasks, lived messily, and prioritized pleasure without consequence. When men do these things, they are framed as carefree, practical, or simply immature. When women do the same things, the behavior becomes a moral issue.

Efficiency is acceptable for men but shameful for women. Female domestic “carelessness” is read not as a neutral lifestyle choice but as failure.

This reaction reveals how deeply women are still expected to shoulder the burden of care, patience, and emotional responsibility. Women are positioned as the emotional carriers of their households, friendships, and families. What unsettles people about the young ho is not the paper towels or the air fryer dinners, but the fact that she is unconcerned with how her choices will be perceived. She is not organizing her life around approval.

The defining principle of the young ho lifestyle is efficiency. The young ho does not concern herself with traditional logistics or time-consuming methods of completing tasks. She prioritizes the end product. Cooking on high heat, combining laundry loads, eating snacks off a paper towel, or pressing the thirty-second button on the microwave are all means to an end.

Some call this rushed. In reality, it is a sign of the times.

Women today work jobs, commute, maintain social lives, pursue education, and nurture personal desires in ways that were simply not available to many women in previous generations. At no point in history have women been expected to do as much, with as little structural support, as they are now. Efficiency creates time, and time creates possibility.

When necessary tasks are completed quickly, women gain access to something earlier generations were rarely afforded: time to explore pleasure, fulfillment, and self-definition outside of obligation. This is not to dismiss the fact that many women in older generations found meaning and peace in domestic labor. Rather, it asks what else might have been possible if they had been granted more time for themselves.

TikTok comments serve as cultural evidence, revealing how widely shared this experience is. In response to videos framing the young ho as a feminist figure, users wrote:

“Young hoes are just women experiencing power and freedom for the first time and actually enjoying it.”

“I’m deadass my ancestors’ wildest dreams.”

“My grandma didn’t even drive. Let’s celebrate that I can drive.”

“My mom had two kids by twenty-two. I’ll be twenty-two with two diplomas. Young hoes with education.”

These comments place the trend within a longer historical arc. The young ho measures herself not against ideals of perfection but against generational progress. The joke becomes a way of acknowledging how far women have come, even when their lives look messy.

Lists of “young ho allegations” further illustrate this point. Eating snacks on a paper towel, cooking everything on high heat, not letting the car warm up, leaving clothes unfolded, using a Swiffer instead of mopping, relying on delivery apps, or pulling clean clothes from the dryer one item at a time are not signs of failure. They are markers of a life lived in motion.

What appears to be carelessness or laziness is, in fact, a refusal to organize womanhood around respectability, productivity, or male legibility.

This sense of empowerment did not emerge in a vacuum. It was cultivated through culture, particularly through music. Many young women came of age listening to artists who articulated confidence, desire, and financial independence with unapologetic clarity. Early 2010s rap by women like Nicki Minaj and Trina centered on wealth, exclusivity, and ambition. Songs like “Boss Ass Bitch” and “Stupid Hoe” reframed arrogance as self-defense and success as survival.

As the decade progressed, the tone evolved. Artists such as City Girls, Saweetie, Flo Milli, and Monaleo pushed beyond simply claiming space within patriarchy to questioning its relevance altogether. Lyrics about returning men to the streets, prioritizing oneself, or refusing emotional labor signaled a shift from demanding respect to withdrawing investment. The bravado was no longer just about money but about autonomy.

For many young women, this music provided permission. It normalized a version of womanhood that was loud, pleasure-seeking, imperfect, and self-directed. The young ho attends class in the morning, works a shift in the afternoon, eats dinner quickly, and goes out dancing at night. She releases stress in real time rather than postponing joy. On other nights, she stays in, orders food with a friend, and rests. Both choices are valid.

There is liberation in this rhythm. The young ho may not cook a pot roast or mend a tear in her tights, but she is pursuing a degree. She is working, paying her bills, and providing for herself. Snacks on paper towels and full loads of laundry coexist with ambition.

This is a form of feminism that centers women rather than institutions. It does not abandon the critique of patriarchy, but it no longer requires constant confrontation to prove worth. It prioritizes lived fulfillment.

Efficiency, however, is not the same as ease. Living this way can be exhausting. Survival mode is not sustainable forever. Many young women fear slowing down because they have watched older generations submit to routines that left little room for joy or self-exploration. There is a sense that even a brief pause risks losing opportunities that women were historically denied.

There is a cost to always being on, to maximizing time because it feels scarce. Some women are deeply tired. Still, for many, the grind paired with pleasure is what keeps them moving forward. The promise of independence, stability, and self-determination outweighs the exhaustion, at least for now.

The young ho is not rejecting responsibility. She is rejecting the idea that womanhood must be proven through sacrifice.

This is feminism that no longer performs resistance through respectability, but practices autonomy through self-orientation.