Paris' Opposite

June 9, 2007 9:18 AM

Tired of hearing about crazy, spoiled women such as Paris and Lindsey, I want to know if there are any really rich, really accomplished young women out there doing fabulous things. Know any?
posted by BlackRose to Society & Culture (33 answers total)

Related AskMe.
posted by ClaudiaCenter at 9:27 AM on June 9, 2007

Jane Magazine recently did a 30 Under 30 review of successful young women (May issue, not on line). But the young women featured mostly were not born wealthy.
posted by ClaudiaCenter at 9:43 AM on June 9, 2007

See this recent post from the blue for one possible example.
posted by dilettante at 9:56 AM on June 9, 2007

Heh. Apparently there is only one contemporary example. And she is no longer young (by Paris-Lindsey standards).
posted by ClaudiaCenter at 10:11 AM on June 9, 2007

Depends what you define as fabulous. Some people might think snorting sacks of cocaine and going to premieres is perfectly fabulous. Also, I take it you mean girls born into rich families? Otherwise I am sure there are many rich female athletes that contribute to a lot of good causes.
posted by fire&wings at 10:27 AM on June 9, 2007

There are a huge number of young women from moderately weathly families (think: daughters of lawyers, bankers, entreprenuers, doctors in large wealthy urban areas) that have used the leg up they've gotten into professional careers as a springboard to doing a lot of charitable work. I'm not just talking ladies who lunch type work here, either. You wouldn't have heard of these women because they aren't super-socialite level, but in my mind they certainly qualify as rich, accomplished and doing minorly fabulous things (for the world). See, for example, some of the women in 85 Broads.
posted by ch1x0r at 10:40 AM on June 9, 2007

you know, it's cheesy, but i like angelina jolie. she does ridiculous movies and has a somewhat screwy personal life, but she does a heck of a lot more than the average joe to make the world a better place.

natalie portman seems to have her head screwed on right--she's going to grad school right now. danica mckellar went from tv fame to authoring a new math theorem.
posted by thinkingwoman at 10:41 AM on June 9, 2007

Rory Kennedy makes documentaries about real issues, like Appalachian poverty and her latest, "The Ghosts of Abu Ghraib." Paris would think that last was a Hardy Boys title, assuming she'd ever heard of the Hardy Boys.
posted by GaelFC at 10:52 AM on June 9, 2007

Marissa Mayer is relatively young, insanely smart, successful and hot.
posted by mattholomew at 11:02 AM on June 9, 2007

I think both the Gore girls and Chelsea Clinton turned out quite well.

I hear the young lady from the Pritzker family (her name escapes me) is a very nice person. And I don't hear anything bad about Athina Roussel.

And as much as I despise her father, I'm quite impressed with how together Ivanka Trump seems to be.

Honestly, I think the Parises of the world are the extremes which is why they get all the news coverage. There are probably just as many rich girls out there who are budding philanthropists as there are brainless party girls. And I'm sure there are plenty more just leading regular, though comfortable lives.
posted by Jess the Mess at 11:02 AM on June 9, 2007

You might look at the movie Born Rich. It's made by the heir to the Johnson & Johnson family fortune -- he basically interviews his friends and other extremely rich kids.

It's interesting -- and terrifying -- to see what life is like in the absence of any real material pressures. It's like the lack of consequences makes personal choices much less meaningful. Predictably, a lot of these kids seem disoriented and depressed. (One of them described how he tried for years to get an advanced degree -- no one in his family ever had -- only to succumb to severe depression.)

The saner ones seem to have found something to do -- equestrian competitions, making purses, charity work, anything -- and pursued it diligently. Georgina Bloomberg is one example. Ivanka Trump is another.
posted by ourobouros at 11:30 AM on June 9, 2007 [1 favorite]

It could be argued that Ivanka Trump is the anti-Paris.
posted by brain cloud at 11:33 AM on June 9, 2007

How about Melinda Gates? She was a Microsoft manager once upon a time. She's 42 - I hope that still qualifies as young :-)

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is giving scads of money to fight malaria and other non-glamorous diseases.
posted by lukemeister at 11:46 AM on June 9, 2007

The mention of equestrian sport brings to mind Zara Phillips. World and European eventing champion, and also is involved in various charities.
posted by djgh at 11:46 AM on June 9, 2007

Paul McCartney's daughter, Stella, is a successful fashion designer and active in the animal rights movement.

Bono and Bob Geldof do a lot for African aid and debt relief. Elton John raises a ton of money for AIDS research. Angelina Jolie and Mia Farrow probably account for half the foreign adoptions in the world.
posted by HotPatatta at 11:58 AM on June 9, 2007

There's a young woman named Rachel Kovner who probably fits the bill. Father Bruce Kovner is worth $2.5 billion. Rachel attended Harvard College and Stanford Law School.
Of course, her father played a part in getting her there, right? Maybe, but she deserves all the credit for graduating with the highest recorded GPA in Stanford Law history. Right now she's clerking on the 4th Circuit, and will begin her Supreme Court clerkship for Antonin Scalia this fall. According to reports from classmates on the linked site, she's also "sweet" and "very modest."
posted by Partial Law at 12:33 PM on June 9, 2007

How about Serena Altschul?

Aerin Lauder is both an executive at the family business, Estee Lauder, and a philanthropist.

Samantha Boardman is a society page regular and has been referred to as Park Avenue Princess but she is also a Harvard and Cornell-educated medical doctor.
posted by needled at 1:26 PM on June 9, 2007

Ali Hewson
http://www.alihewson.com/
posted by 4ster at 2:08 PM on June 9, 2007

I don't know how rich these girls are, but I think it's relevant: "The REAL hot 100 is changing the way young women are portrayed in the media but we need your help.
posted by ajr at 2:12 PM on June 9, 2007

Hands down: Danica McKellar. Ex-Wonder Years star, math geek, celebrity tutor.
posted by scblackman at 2:13 PM on June 9, 2007 [1 favorite]

Ashley Judd does a lot of AIDS education work and is a fairly outspoken feminist.
posted by phrontist at 2:29 PM on June 9, 2007

As ironic as it may seem, Paris' little sister Nikki Hilton is actually doing something. Okay, she may not be your definition of "accomplished", but instead of living of her daddy's fame, she actually went and studied fashion design and does that now.
It's great that she has a career, because I mean, look at her sister. She could decide that she doesn't want to earn a single cent for the rest of her life and she really won't have to.
posted by alon at 2:52 PM on June 9, 2007

She's not in her twenties, and she may not be rich by Western standards, but consider sexologist Mariela Castro Espín (Raúl's daughter and El Jefe's niece.)
posted by rob511 at 3:41 PM on June 9, 2007

Sarah Pillsbury has been pretty successful, though I have heard that she had her wild side.
posted by MonkeySaltedNuts at 3:51 PM on June 9, 2007

Dylan Lauren, Ralph Lauren's daughter, is a moderately successful entrepreneur who runs a chain of candy stores. She probably wouldn't be in the business without her father's money, but she has built a fairly successful business.
posted by raf at 6:30 PM on June 9, 2007

+1 to Julia Louis-Dreyfus. Gorillamask.net had a great comparison article between JL-D and Paris, but I can't find a working link right now.
posted by Joh at 8:03 PM on June 9, 2007

Ivanka Trump and Angelina Jolie. Both daughters of megastars and both very accomplished, smart women.
posted by thebrokenmuse at 8:22 PM on June 9, 2007

Jess the Mess probably means Liesel Matthews. Her IMDB leads me to E! True Hollywood Story: Trust Fund Babies, which leads me to:

* Holly Branson (dau. of Richard), prefect of St. Edward's School at Oxford
* A niece and daughter of Patty Hearst who aren't screwing up all over the papers even though they're models (one is in art history graduate studies, and another dautgher works in publishing)

Also, there's some at Forbes's Hottest Billionaire Heiresses story/slideshow -- though even they (last year) ranked Paris "first" (whatever that means).
posted by dhartung at 8:31 PM on June 9, 2007

Britain's Princess Anne got into the Olympics. Although the fact that she's royalty could have helped - one still needs to be a pretty decent equestrian to get into the Olympics.
posted by Xere at 10:02 PM on June 9, 2007

There's other royalty. You might question the 'really accomplished bit' if you're so inclined, but (at least on paper) they all have good education, are socially driven, and are quite often pretty damn hot.

- Princess Máxima of the Netherlands.
- Princess Madeleine of Sweden.
- Queen Rania of Jordan
posted by Harry at 12:04 AM on June 10, 2007

Oh, a hometown story. A local company was founded on a kitchen table and eventually sold to Grainger for a bundle. The daughter, Lara Hedberg Deam, founded Dwell magazine.
posted by dhartung at 12:48 AM on June 10, 2007

Severin Cullis-Suzuki is a remarkable young woman and daughter of one of Canada's best-known environmentalists and authors - not sure about the wealth factor, but her father has sold a kajillion books, and now she has one out as well.
posted by Rumple at 11:16 AM on June 10, 2007

Response by poster: Thank you all. I'm tired of trying to explain Paris and Lindsey to my 10 yr old. She just watched the newer version of "The Parent Trap" and wanted to find out more about the movie. That lead to some dispiriting questions. I asked the above question in a fit of pique, disgusted with the way the news seems to love sad, broken, beautiful young women.

You all have provided some great places to look for foils, and I'll be turning my discussions with her from how success can ruin girls to how they use success to better themselves and the world around them. So I'm going to become more familiar with these names so I don't let the media teach my daughter that beauty+success=depressed+drunk.

Thank you.
posted by BlackRose at 9:22 AM on June 11, 2007