When Olivia Rodrigo’s debut album, “SOUR,” came out when I was 15 years old, I played all 11 tracks on repeat for about a month, scarcely listening to anything else. It was the first time an artist released music that felt like it was meant just for me. 

Rodrigo’s lyrics reflected my reality. The song “brutal” chronicled the woes of teenage angst — “I’m so insecure that I think / That I’ll die before I drink” aptly recounts my high school experience. “Happier” soundtracked my unrequited crushes, “jealousy, jealousy” articulated the horrors of doom-scrolling and “hope ur ok” was an ode to all the childhood friends I lost touch with. 

Five years later, it still feels like Rodrigo is ripping her music straight from my journal entries — I don’t even want to cite how many times I’ve listened to “you seem pretty sad for a girl so in love,” which came out in June. In a way, I feel like I’ve grown up with her, navigating heartbreak, imposter syndrome and failed nights out in Silver Lake alongside her releases. Her songs describe girlhood in its beautifully varied forms. 

There’s a quote from a 2021 interview with The Guardian that I love in which Rodrigo says, “I’m a teenage girl, I write about stuff that I feel really intensely. … Do you want me to write a song about income taxes?” She was responding to the blatantly sexist criticism often hurled at women musicians who dare to write songs about their feelings — or worse, a boy.  

Over the past few years, Rodrigo has also made struggling against the patriarchy a subject of her music. “All-american bitch,” the opening track on Rodrigo’s sophomore album, outlines the contradictory roles women are often expected to fulfill in relationships: “I am built like a mother and a total machine.” “Pretty isn’t pretty,” another song on “GUTS,” outlines the absurdity of modern beauty standards. 

On Monday, Rodrigo released her most political track yet globally. “Serena joy,” a new wave-inspired outtake from “you seem pretty sad for a girl so in love,” is a reference to “The Handmaid’s Tale.” Rodrigo’s titular subject is the novel’s antagonist, promoting constrictive ideals of femininity that support her own oppression. Rodrigo warns listeners from succumbing to Joy’s fate through the song’s concise but biting hook, singing: “If they do it to them / They’ll do it to you.” 

A percentage of the single’s proceeds will be donated to the Daisy Chain Fields Fund, a philanthropic initiative tied to her upcoming festival of the same name that will take place Saturday. The fund supports nonprofits advocating for children in need, maternal healthcare, reproductive freedom, survivors of gender-based violence and domestic workers’ rights. Some of the associated nonprofits include FreeFrom, Jhpiego, National Domestic Workers Alliance and Planned Parenthood.

“Serena joy” isn’t the beginning: Rodrigo has a storied history of financially championing causes she cares about. During her GUTS World Tour, she launched the Fund 4 Good, which supported nonprofits protecting girls’ access to education and reproductive healthcare. Net proceeds from ticket sales from her upcoming festival will be donated to multiple charities as well. 

The festival, set to take place Saturday at Great Park in Irvine, will spotlight women musicians of all genres — including Devon Again, Mitski, Sarah McLachlan and Stevie Nicks. The event’s concept is a callback to McLachlan’s Lilith Fair, a concert series dedicated to supporting women artists that began in 1997. 

In many ways, Daisy Chain Fields is simply a continuation of Rodrigo’s commitment to honoring women’s lived experiences. From the get-go, “SOUR” was branded as an album meant for teenage girls — in and of itself a radical act. Two albums later, the scale of Rodrigo’s platform and the influence it yields has only grown: Rodrigo’s rise to fame has proven that celebrities can support causes they care about and still attain widespread commercial success. 

Over the nearly two decades since Lilith Fair’s debut, it almost feels like we’ve gone backwards. Women’s reproductive rights are more threatened now than they were in 1997. Constantly hearing about worsening restrictions on safe access to contraception and reproductive healthcare can give rise to apathy and kill hope, especially when we’re inundated with celebrities pretending to champion issues that don’t affect them. It’s exhausting to care. 

But that’s exactly why it’s so important that Rodrigo is putting her money — and her music — where her mouth is. She’s setting an example for the millions of young women who look up to her. Just because you can’t solve every problem doesn’t mean you can’t make a difference. “If you can’t throw a punch / You can learn how to spit.”

Fiona Feingold is a senior writing about women in the entertainment industry in her column, “Femininomenon,” which runs every other Friday.