In 1999, the year I turned 16, there were three cultural events that seemed to define what it meant to be a young woman—a girl—facing down the new millennium. In April, Britney Spears appeared on the cover of Rolling Stone lying on a pink bed wearing polka-dot panties and a black push‐up bra, clutching a Teletubby doll with one hand and a phone with the other. In September, DreamWorks released American Beauty, a movie in which a middle‐aged man has florid sexual fantasies about his teenage daughter’s best friend; the film later won five Academy Awards, including Best Picture. In November, the teen-clothing brand Abercrombie & Fitch released its holiday catalog, titled “Naughty or Nice,” which featured nude photo spreads, sly references to oral sex and threesomes, and an interview with the porn actor Jenna Jameson, in which she was repeatedly harangued by the interviewer to let him touch her breasts.
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