Object Feature: Phoebe Robinson’s Everything’s Trash, But It’s Okay

Phoebe Robinson is a standup comedian, writer, producer, and New York Times bestselling author. In 2015 Phoebe started a podcast, Two Dope Queens, which later turned into an HBO series. She has continued to host critically acclaimed podcasts such as Sooo Many White Guys and Black Frasier. In 2016 Phoebe debuted her first book, You Can’t Touch My Hair: And Other Things I Still Have to Explain which quickly became a New York Times bestseller.

In 2018, Phoebe followed up her debut release with Everything’s Trash, But It’s Okay. The collection of essays tackles socially timely topics with a humorous spin on the severity of the subject matter. Outfitted with on-point pop culture references, these essays tackle a wide range of topics: giving feminism a tough-love talk on intersectionality, telling society’s beauty standards to kick rocks, and calling foul on our culture’s obsession with work.

Robinson also gets personal, exploring money problems she’s hidden from her parents, how dating is mainly a warmed-over bowl of hot mess, and definitely most important, meeting Bono not once, but twice. She’s struggled with being a woman with a political mind and a woman with an ever-changing jeans size. She knows about trash because she sees it every day — and because she’s seen roughly one hundred thousand hours of reality TV and zero hours of Schindler’s List. With the intimate voice of a new best friend, Everything’s Trash, But It’s Okay is a candid perspective for a generation that has had the rug pulled out from under it too many times to count.

The Feminist Institute is immensely grateful to share Phoebe’s work with our community by raffling it off in our GXRLCRUSH Benefit Raffle alongside other authors like Billie Jean King, Diana Nyad, and Elizabeth Lesser.

This blog post is also available on our Substack.