The UPS package was so valuable it required a signature. Despite my not having ordered anything, I knew what was inside. Within the plain cardboard was another box—sleek and black, a familiar logo on the front read Saint Laurent. Beneath the lid, I tore through a mille-feuille of tissue to reveal soft, cotton drawstring bags, which, after pulling open, a pair of creamy-white, calfskin, knee-high boots emerged. Everyone knows: the more layers to unwrap, the more expensive the contents.
The price tag: $1,700. I paid nothing. A man I barely know sent them to me after I shared their image on my Instagram stories. He DM’ed, asking for my address, shoe size, and nothing else—other than my silence on his identity (he’s married and semi-famous). I agreed.
What is this game? I thought. A man had never given me something so big for so little effort. Can I harness this power? I wondered.
I put on my new boots and walked out the front door.
***
I’ve been aware of being objectified long before I even knew what an object was and how anyone could be -ified. I modeled for my first Target ad at four years old. Much of my childhood played out in front of the camera. My image a commodity, when I didn’t understand anything about capital or labor. What I did know was that I was lucky to be there, to be chosen—and for the dream to continue, I learned to do as I was told, wear what I was given, be polite, a good girl, and put my needs aside. Get the job done. And smile, don’t forget to smile.
Being beautiful was an unearned blessing. Therefore, I paid penance. When I hit puberty, I began to experience a darker side of pretty privilege. Glass was broken in a local shop window. The only thing taken? A cardboard cut out of me. A man called my phone and breathed into the receiver up to a hundred times a day. Men flocked to my various teen jobs, at the 1950s diner where I waitressed, and the coffee shop, elbows on the counter, eyeballs fixed on me as if I were an exotic bird. I served them food and they shared how often they fantasized about me while they jerked off. A secret admirer left animal bones and love letters in the mailbox at my apartment.
The date rape I normalized. The kidnapping I survived. The powerful men I met in a professional capacity, whose persuasions turned to threats like the flick of a switch. And most disappointing of all, perhaps, the “friends” who revealed ulterior motives after so long.
***
Last year, on TikTok I began posting my #OOTD’s, inspired by girls like Devon Lee Carlson and Dronme who’ve built online communities of women interested in fashion, culture, and feminism. I thought I was being like them and myself—cool, cute, not overtly sexy. But when a video of me in a fluorescent green, crocheted dress popped off into the tens of thousands, all the comments, DMs, and follows were from men.
It felt like my algorithms broke. My socials became inundated with the men asking the color of my underwear, offers to fly me to Colorado for a date, proposals of marriage. It carried on like this, so I began referring to them as my TikTok Boyfriends and folding them into stories on my Substack. Everything is copy, Nora Ephron said.
Holly Solem • Photo: Alani Waters.
Longing for some female engagement and sick of all the dudes and their endless avalanche of opinions, I started to post videos of myself crying and talking about my heavy period. I stopped wearing makeup and showering, and donned ranch dressing stained, pilling sweats with holes, and the thick, nerdy glasses I need without my contact lenses. I got loud about my issues with IBS and constipation. It backfired.
Your blood covenant is the power of your holiness. That period is what makes you greater than the life you bring into the world –@zksharpe
I like you cause you’re raw and honest way more than most people – @mondo
I want to hear more about your periods – @mrjommins
Well, um, I can help you get un-constipated. – @tylerdurdenreset
In exposing this other side of myself, I may have fallen off my pedestal, but it seemed I landed in the muck of accessibility. No matter what I did, I was stuck with the men. I wondered what I could do with them, how I might make them useful. Perhaps I can monetize them, I thought, remembering the ease with which I’d acquired the boots.
“Should I start an Only Fans?” I asked in a video.
The men were resounding: “NO”.
We like you for your wit and humor – @EricWard928
Don’t do it, we love your brain! – @VonDarko
My best friend saw the video and phoned to deliver a lecture.
“What about your credibility in the lit world?” She asked.
“What lit credibility?” I said. “It only adds up to my writing about my past as a wild, sexually depraved, addict.” Anyway, my friend’s reasoning seemed like archaic thinking to me in this age where visibility is power. We can control our image — how we sell and market it. It’s hard not to notice that most of the paid subscribers on my Substack are men. Is this a result of the wage-gap? Men just have more money? Or is it me, unable to escape saying stuff and doing stuff that men find curious? And would I be seen as more, or less, valuable if I took my top off?
Money is power. Money is freedom. If it doesn’t necessarily buy happiness, it certainly doesn’t not buy happiness. My relationship to it, and my understanding of my own personal power, is unfortunately twisted up in sex, my self-image, femininity, and the male gaze. That’s probably why I have so little money. Because it’s fraught with confusion as to the role I’m supposed to play in order to earn. My own limiting beliefs are blocks for me—when I have the money, I’ll see an executive coach about that—but I’m not exactly unique.
Women’s relationship to money has always been fraught. We were only able to have our own bank accounts and credit cards starting in 1974. We couldn’t obtain a business loan without a man’s signature until 1988 (a few years after I was born). Today, in 2025, women still statistically earn %16 less than men. My mother “married well.” Twice. She started a business that my father funded. Later, she went back to school, paid for by her second husband, who supported her financially throughout. I say this, not to diminish her hard work in building a business and earning a degree. But I’ve never seen a woman in my family have success wholly on her own, and if she appeared to, it was still through and under the thumb of a man’s whims and decisions.
***
Meanwhile, my fledgling media empire—such as it was, the de rigueur trifecta: Substack, podcast, IG—was beginning to turn a small profit, mainly because of my male following. To further expand, I felt the prick of a double-edged sword at my throat – you gotta have money to make money. I needed investors.
Who do I know with lots of money?
Two people came to mind, low hanging fruit, ripe and ready to be plucked. They were men, of course. I am single. Therefore, most of the ones I know personally, I’ve dated. The first, I’d connected with through a friend, when he begged for an introduction after peeping my TikTok.
There’s no reason I should have stayed on good terms with this guy seeing as he grabbed my head and stuck his tongue in my mouth upon our first, in-real-life meeting. But my “good girl training” had me pretzel twisting my brain to make nice, thinking this was somehow my fault, I’d led him on and put myself in this awkward position. He’d flaunted his wealth by flying me across the country to his turf (New York) and putting me up at the hotel of my choice (The Bowery) for our first date.
This was after a few weeks of texting that escalated to cute, non-sexual facetimes, and besides being very rich, he seemed like one of the good guys. He regaled me with stories of his love of helping female entrepreneurs by providing a source of wisdom, and as an angel investor.
I felt a sense of entitlement returning to him with my business plan after sexually rejecting him, as I considered how chill I’d been over what, by today’s societal standards would be deemed inappropriate, even assault-like. All was momentarily forgiven when he expressed interest in helping me.
The second man had DM’d me on TikTok and I agreed to have dinner with him under one condition – that I would write about it. At dinner, it became apparent that he was a true fan of my work, based on how much he already knew about me. The balance was off, putting me in a position of power. But then he tipped the scale by letting me know he’d made so much money, he never had to work again. I tucked this tidbit into my back pocket for a rainy day.
Holly Solem • Photo: Alani Waters.
It was sunny in LA, but I hoped he might make it rain when I showed him my pitch deck and walked him through my spiel. He surprised me by saying he was in. For eleven thousand dollars. Just like the moment I received those boots – I felt this wonderful surge of power lifting me up to the ceiling, making me feel Incredible Hulk-like. Up until then, I had no idea you could simply ask a man for money. Of course, there had to be an exchange. I’d offered a percentage, but TikTok Guy made it clear, in writing: He didn’t want any financial return or ownership of my company. So, what did he want?
New York Guy, as it turned out, just wanted someone to talk to about the nature of his orgasms, and preferences for achieving them. An exchange I was unwilling to make. While I felt empowered pulling the plug on New York Guy, and taking money from TikTok Guy, I couldn’t help but feel a tug on my sleeve, that nagging little voice of truth. The money didn’t come directly from my work. Its source was due to a man fancying me as a potential bed partner. Frustrated, I realized my worth as a creator and attempts to be taken seriously as a businessperson were still tangled in my objectification and sexuality.
***
I got mad – boiling, bubbling, and exploding into a spewing volcano of feminine rage. It wasn’t fair, these men having all the money. When I examined the why, pulling the thread and following it back to the beginning of my life in the workforce, I saw it clearly: While I was being breadcrumbed, molested, and having my time wasted by men in power, they were able to get ahead. I needed to catch up.
I spoke directly to the camera, explaining my epiphany and desire to get financially caught up, knowing TikTok Guy and all the TikTok boyfriends from around the globe would see: “I’m too busy working to engage with men. If you’re not work related, family, or someone I’m dating, and you’re wealthy, you’re going to have to pony up to gain access to me. A couple grand a month for my thoughts and empathy through text messaging seems like a good place to start. Consider it a rich man, friend tax,” I concluded.
I turned off the camera and went for a hike. Then I came back home and to reality.
Ah yes, prostitution – @cuntlord_606_
I can tell you’re damaged – @palmtreetrimmer
Arrogant pretty privilege. Wow. And playing into every stereotype that feminism should eschew. What a hypocrite. – @ts53321
***
I’ve considered sex work. It’s straightforward, clean in how the roles and exchanges are defined. But it always comes back to how I want to spend my days and if it’s worth it. Maybe my attempts to monetize men was a waste of my effort, blocking my true path to abundance. Perhaps it was me all along, who was not valuing myself or the hours in my day. TikTok and its accompanying negativity sure took up a lot of them, so I deleted the app from my phone.
I decentralized men. I quit thinking about them and engaging with the ones outside of my immediate realm. I stopped going on dates and secretly hoping one of them might save me. Soon after, I noticed feeling lighter. Freer. I’d become more productive in my chosen career. I wrote this essay. In pursuing a return on what I felt was owed to me by men, I was, in a sense, letting them own me.
The boots are not practical. Though I suppose something you wouldn’t buy for yourself makes a good gift. They’re painfully beautiful, and hurt like hell to wear, the creamy leather is easily scuffed. They mostly sit in their box under my bed. When I do wear them, I’m incapacitated and unable to really do much, other than sit still and look pretty. And I wonder if that was the point.
