I can still clearly remember sitting in my dadâs race car when I was six as he got ready to do race prep on the car. I didnât understand much of what he was doing, and honestly, I was pretty much just interested in making âvroom vroomâ noises in the driverâs seat rather than holding the flashlight for him again. 13 years later, I still make âvroom vroomâ noises in the driverâs seat, but itâs in my own car instead of my dadâs. Cars are a huge part of my life, thanks to my dad, and in my free time I enjoy posting my car on social media.
For those unfamiliar with the car community, it is fairly common for enthusiasts to post edits and photos of their cars on social media, mainly Instagram and TikTok. My experience posting in the car community as a female has been overwhelmingly positiveâbut Iâm one of the lucky ones. The majority of people I have interacted with online in the community have been very cool and donât care if Iâm a man or a woman. What matters is that there is a mutual appreciation of cars. However, there is the occasional person who doesnât exactly agree with that.
The first TikTok I posted that got a bit of traction, just over 7000 likes, was back in 2022 and I was so excited about it. Since it had more traction than most of my videos, I was getting a lot more comments than I was used to, and I was doing my best to respond to all of them. Again, being one of the lucky ones, the majority of responses were people who were super cool and genuinely just shared a hobby with me. One of the comments Iâll never forget, though, was from a user who decidedly thought I was using cars for attention and followed it up by telling me I wasnât pretty enough to get attention from cars. Unfortunately, comments like this run rampant in the comment sections of girls who post about their love of cars. TikToks are posted all the time making fun of female car influencers and calling car girls cringey or using it for attention. So why is there such a strong hatred for âcar girlsâ and why do many of us feel like there is a difference between âcar girlsâ and female car enthusiasts?
You can say sexism is the root cause for men disliking womenâs presence in the community, and that might not be entirely wrong, but the root of this run much deeper than that. Women like Lella Lombardi and Vicki Wood have been racing since the mid 1900s when it was a delusional idea, and modern-day drivers like Danica Patrick, Hailee Deegan, and Lia Block still make names for women in the community without an absurd amount of backlash. On the other hand, a quick scroll through most female car influencerâs social media will show the hate that car girls regularly get.
Unfortunately, when you look at some of the most popular accounts of these influencers, an large amount of them have used their sex appeal to gain a mass following. Posting half-nude photos in front of an M5 Competition is a surefire way to get likes as it targets the male demographic heavily. Many of these girls make use of sites like OnlyFans, as well, and whether or not they have a genuine interest in cars, they give âcar girlsâ a dirty name.
The other side of female car influencers are girls who just make content because they love it and donât use the fact that theyâre a woman to gain a following. Weirdly, these girls are usually the ones who get the most hate. Interpret that as you will but there is a plethora of female influencers who post content for fun and to share their hobby, most of whom grew up around cars, and they get told that theyâre in it for attention. The OnlyFans girls and so-called automotive models have ruined the car scene for women who simply enjoy being involved in the community, and arenât in it for attention, sex appeal, or money. There is an association with âcar girlsâ as girls who pose nude with sports cars and donât have any interest in cars, which perpetuates the idea that women donât belong in the community.
Thus, many of us girls will refuse to call ourselves âcar girlsâ and instead will just call ourselves enthusiasts. It doesnât stop people from being hateful if they want to but itâs an attempt to separate us from the sex-driven and âfake car girlâ scene that has given us a bad rep. Girls like Hailee Deegan and Lia Block donât get this âfake car girlâ hate because theyâve already proven themselves as real from their backgrounds and qualifications. Any female car enthusiast who wants respect pretty much has to prove herself with such or she will face the infamous âfake car girlâ allegations.
This is not to say all of the males in the community are accusatory and horrible and deny us of our roles in the community, though. I have met tons of people (both male and female) through the online car community that are genuine and supportive. A lot of my closest friends have come from cars. My hometown has a decent car scene and Iâve never encountered anyone who has questioned me or my love of cars. I think the âcar girlâ hate really stems from the bad rep we have gotten, and social media has perpetuated this idea that âcar girlsâ are cringey. Women who are part of the car scene in person, in my opinion, never get the same hate as women online, and I think that is because the influencing aspect of it has been part of the reason for all of this hate.
Again, Iâve been one of the lucky ones, and my thoughts on this topic come from my experiences and observations in the community. This is definitely a controversial subject in the community, but I know many of the girls Iâve spoken to have felt the same way I do. At the end of the day, whether youâre a man or a woman, the car scene should be about cars, not sex.