I believe the general perception among Westerners (who are aware of gyaru and aware that it isn’t just an anime trope) is that gyaru have gone extinct. This is a perspective shared by some Japanese people as well.

This perception likely stems from the fact the mainstream image of a gyaru (a kogal; tan skin, blond hair, loose socks, long nails, etc.) is not how gyaru tend to look nowadays, resulting in the belief that there are less of them. Now, to be clear, there are fewer gyaru now than there were before, but the numbers are much higher than most people expect.

The main gyaru types nowadays are:

• Modern Kuro-Gyaru

  The modern incarnation of the Kuro-Gyaru. Tan skin yes, slightly bolder style than Shiro-Gyaru, but more reserved than the original Kuro-Gyaru. Women in their twenties. Primarily represented by the magazine Egg.

• Modern Shiro-Gyaru

  The modern Shiro-Gyaru. The dominant type. Onee-Gyaru and ‘Reiwa’ Gyaru are both different flavors of Shiro-Gyaru. They tend to have a more ‘reserved’ and ‘cleaner’ look, meaning white skin, more reserved makeup and fashion and so on.

• ‘Reiwa’ Gyaru

  Galture identified this. They are the most modern of the Gyaru and don’t have any particular unifying trait. There’s a greater emphasis on individuality and a lower emphasis on belonging to particular cliques. We can consider these the ‘chameleon’ Gyaru, because they’re the hardest to explicitly identify as such.

• Onee-Gyaru

  More ‘grown-up’ gyaru. Primarily women in the workforce, in their mid-late twenties or early thirties.

I’m getting these from the Galture website (linked below), which is a website run by a gyaru or former gyaru.^B) The above are simplifications which I may have to edit later.

Many things that used to be associated exclusively with gyaru are now just things that young women and girls…do.

• Gyaru makeup? The cleaner varieties are basically how most girls apply makeup now.
• Decorating phones? Yup.
• Fashion? A lot of gyaru and gyaru-adjacent fashion is basically mainstream now.^D;E)
• Language? I’m pretty sure a lot of mainstream youth slang originated with gyaru.^F)
• Piercings? Multiple earrings and piercings are not uncommon.^G)

I could go on (and probably will in the future, when I decide to refine this section), but I think I’ve made the point.

I could also bring up things like general social warmth and friendliness. With Japanese girls nowadays come across as much friendlier than Japanese girls from a few decades ago. At least says me, someone with no experience talking to Japanese girls from a few decades ago. This could also be gyaru influence on the mainstream, since they could be considered the first to really push in this direction.

That’s pretty much odd. Think to the early 2000s emo/punk girl archetype, which basically only existed during the 2000s and never any other time. That’s only like 10 years, if even that.

Then let’s consider the gyaru. If we put their start in the 80s and their ‘end’ the 2010s, then gyaru lasted 30 years. And they didn’t even end in the 2010s, since they’re still around…meaning that gyaru have been around continuously in some form for 40 years.

This is already quite unusual from a sociological perspective…but then…

Gyaru-Mama are a distinct subculture of gyaru that started in the 2000s and which may also continue to today. Gyaru-Mama are Gyaru who became moms while remaining gyaru. Yes, it’s really that simple.

These are also incredibly unusual for a subculture to have. Think about the implications here. Most subcultures tend to die out because its members abandon it. But with gyaru, not only do you see the subculture lasting for longer than a single generation, but those older generations remain inside of it. And they then pass it on to their children.

But I think there’s a bit more to this too.

When you compare gyaru to other “rebellious feminine subcultures” something stands out immediately: gyaru don’t discourage long-term heterosexual relationships with one person. In fact, they seem to actively encourage such relationships.

Many feminist subcultural movements typically encourage remaining single, childless and/or to avoid having a single partner. Gyaru culture places heavy emphasis on loyalty and social warmth. The former approach guarantees your subculture dies with your generation, because you don’t have any children to pass it onto; the latter approach guarantees your subculture survives into the future, with the children you brought into this world.

I think this is why Gyaru-Mama can exist in the first place, plus how gyaru have survived for so long.^H)