Malala Yousafzai is a Gen Z Badass
By Romen Basu Borsellino | 27 Oct, 2025

Amid her latest press tour, the public is starting to learn that there’s much more to the global icon than the one-dimensional image of her they had in their mind.

Nobel Laureate Malala Yousafzai is often mentioned in the same breath as such female icons as Harriet Tubman, Amelia Earhart, Ann Frank, and Rosa Parks.

But unlike Yousafzai, the other aforementioned heroines were not taking bong rips in a dorm room just a few years ago.

Malala Yousafzai was recently a guest on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon

It’s a story Yousafzai tells in her new memoir “Finding My Way,” and it serves as a reminder that, in many ways, Malala is your standard Gen Z-er who follows the latest internet trends, goes to concerts, and fangirls over celebrities like Riz Ahmed.

Yousafzai with her new book 'Finding My Way'

At the same time, her story of smoking weed in college, a rite of passage for many in their early twenties, quickly reinforces the reality that she will never get to live the same life as her peers, for better or worse.  This particular experience — in which her first time consuming marijuana led her to mentally relive a traumatic assassination attempt on her life — was certainly for the worse.

That story, accompanied by various joyful public appearances by Yousafzai as part of her press tour over the past few weeks, are a reminder of how how singularly unique Malala Yousafzai is. 

I Am Malala

Yousafzai's viral — and playful — dig at her husband.

For those who may know the name Malala but struggle to place who exactly she is, particularly in an age where social media tends to give equal attention to reality TV stars and actual, literal, heroes, here’s a quick refresher:

In 2009 Malala Yousafzai was just an 11 year-old girl in Swat Valley Pakistan, trying to go to school.  The Pakistani Taliban, the jihadist military organization overseeing the region, had banned girls from receiving an education after age 15. 

So Yousafzai did what many a pre-teen might: She got online. 

But rather than just surfing MySpace and Facebook, she began blogging about the injustice that she and her female peers were facing.   And before long, her attempts to expose the Taliban’s repressive treatment toward girls and women, which included blowing up over 100 schools in the area, went viral. 

Soon Yousafzai dropped the pseudonym she had been hiding behind — Gul Makai, which means “Corn flower” in Pashto and refers to a Pashtun folk character — and became a global icon, known for speaking truth to power despite the risks she was assuming for exposing the Taliban. 

Then one day in 2012 a gunman entered the bus that she was riding home from school in and demanded to know which girl was Yousafzai or else he would begin shooting indiscriminately. 

When Yousafzai was identified, he shot her in the face at close range.  It was a premeditated attack, ordered by the Taliban’s leader. 

But the Taliban’s attempt to silence her backfired.  They failed to kill Malala Yousafzai.

After being airlifted to a Pakistani military hospital and ultimately transported to the UK, Yousafzai, miraculously survived. And her voice became louder than ever. 

During her recovery, millions online and at protests around the world adopted the slogan “I Am Malala” as a show of solidarity.

The Aftermath

In the years that followed the attempt on her life, having relocated to the UK with her family, she became a global icon.

During just the year after the assassination attempt, she authored the memoir “I Am Malala,” met with the Obama family in the Oval Office and Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace, and addressed the United Nations.

In 2014, at age 17, Yousafzai became a co-recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, making her the youngest winner in the prestigious award’s history.

But despite all she had accomplished, Yousafzai was still just a teenager who surely wanted the same things that so many her age were entitled to: friends, hanging out, eating junk food and watching tv devoid of any educational value. 

In some ways, given who she was and how the world saw her, she might never be able to achieve these goals.  And yet, from taking on the Taliban to surviving a gunshot to the head, she already had a penchant for achieving the unlikely.

In October 2017 she began college at the UK’s prestigious University of Oxford.

And not long after, she met a man who she fell in love with and married. 

“I’m a Funny Person”

Another thing about history’s most influential women is that few have ever ‘broken the internet.'

Yousafzai did just that in 2023 when she posted a photo of her and her husband next to a marketing display for the film Barbie.

“This Barbie has a Nobel Prize,” the caption read. “He’s just Ken.”

It was hilarious for reasons including the direct parody on the movie’s tagline and dig taken at her own husband.  But it particularly caught people’s attention because they weren’t aware of Malala’s silly side.

As a society we have a tendency to ascribe certain qualities to various types of people.  And even the most progressive can fall into the trap of assuming that bold outspoken champions of women’s rights are uptight killjoys who hate fun.

And even if one didn’t assume that of Yousafzai from the start, a near-death assassination attempt like the one she endured at age 15 — leaving her with partial facial paralysis — might have understandably hardened her.

And, yet, as she accurately told Jimmy Fallon on the Tonight Show last week, “I’m a funny person.”

During her brief guest appearance, Yousafzai:

- Mused that while she’s 28 years old, people assume that she's either an historical figure from the 1800s or still a 15 year-old

- Recorded a TikTok video duet with Fallon to an R-rated Nicki Minaj rap

- And noted that despite what preconceived notions people may have of her, she is a "normal person, who loves to have fun, makes mistakes, and find more about herself, and grow through that".

Don’t call it a rebrand

Yousafzai's book tour has certainly succeeded in achieving the news coverage it was seeking. Many an article have either described her heavy use of social media, memes, and pop culture references as a rebrand.  But such labels are not particularly accurate.

For years now, Yousafzai has publicly flexed her social chops.  During a pre-pandemic Q&A in Los Angeles, for example, she was asked if she was relieved that Greta Thunberg didn’t win the Nobel Prize and thus displace her as the youngest to do so.

“I just got to LA and you’re already trying to replace me with a younger woman,” Malala playfully shot back at the questioner, a friend of hers.

While she has of course sharpened with age, that is who Malala Yousafzai has always been. 

The publicity of the book tour has meant greater exposure to those less familiar. But it does not mean that she has changed. Rather, most people are simply learning Malala Yousafzai goes well beyond the one-dimensional image of her that they had in their mind.

Now, years after, over 15 years after 11 year-old Malala began blogging about the plight of women under the Taliban, she has produced an Oscar-nominated documentary short, written three books, produced a Broadway musical alongside Hillary Clinton, landing a deal with Apple TV+, and founding a multi-million dollar women’s sports investment initiative alongside her husband, Asser Malik. 

And did I mention that her memes are also top notch?