Is The Girl-ification Of Everything Anti-Feminist?

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YES

Aoife CodyKane – Digital Editor

Girlhood is beautiful. Being a girl is beautiful! The recent explosion of love for femininity and general ‘girliness’ through film, art and culture is such a wonderful thing. I think back on the internalised misogyny of my teens and despair at how much I tried to suppress the little girl that I was then; turning my nose up at anything inherently girly in order to prove that I was ‘valuable’.

That’s why I love that women and girls are now being affirmed in their femininity. The world is finally embracing all things twee, coquette, romantic and super pink. It’s been a long time coming! However, what I don’t love is the way this renewed affection for girliness is being weaponised. There’s a subtle but nonetheless sinister trend of equating girliness with a very traditional understanding of what it means to be feminine.

It’s something I see lurking behind ‘harmless’ TikTok and social media trends; namely, the way we’ve started playing with the word ‘girl’. Girl dinner, girl math, girl-whatever-you-like. First, I thought it was a little cute. Girl dinner is made up of picky bits, girl math means I can justify adding fifty quid to my shopping cart because I get free shipping! But there’s also something about it that I find strange. Why would a small, modest meal be seen as girly? Why is not being financially literate seen as a ‘girl’ thing?

It feels like a sneaky way of promoting traditional attitudes toward women’s supposed ‘place in the world’. I’ve noticed that the girl maths meme always seems to be  this conservative, oppressive idea of womanhood. Twitter is littered with jokes like, “I don’t need to learn to drive if my boyfriend can–I’m just a girl!” or “Nibbling on a biscuit and Diet Coke for dinner because I’m just a 24 year old girl!”. Sure it can be funny, and silly, and at times I can relate (I can’t drive or cook well, and I’m terrible at maths).

But it also reinforces the notion that women are inherently helpless, that men should be our providers, and that being ‘girly’ equates to being dumb, weak, and uninspired. When I hear ‘girl’ used as a prefix, I hear a clear message: the word ‘girl’ is used to make things smaller, sillier and less than. Why can’t being girly mean being strong, smart and brilliant? You don’t see anyone using ‘boy’ the same way–because we don’t infantilise men. The way I love to see women celebrating their unity isn’t by expressing reductive, archaic stereotypes. It’s by lifting each other up, being proud of what real girlhood represents, and showing the world that girliness isn’t synonymous with stupidity. Girl maths? Nah. Girl power!

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NO

Bronwyn O’Neill – Staff Writer

Yes, I recognise that women and men are equal. And I understand that perhaps saying ‘girl maths’ and ‘girl dinner’ may come off, well, a bit problematic. But there is something just so heartwarming to have a joint experience with a woman you’ve never met. Knowing that I’m not the only person who thinks you ‘made’ money by buying something on sale or calculating the cost per wear of an overly expensive bag.

Womanhood or girlhood is such a unifying experience and I think that needs to be celebrated. Like with all trends, things go too far and my eye will twitch when I see people try to explain complex issues with ‘girl politics’ and start describing a house party as an analogy for war. But putting ribbons in your hair and embracing that side that so many of us pushed down because it was “unprofessional” or not “mature” enough to be wearing ribbons or pink or, God forbid, putting an exclamation mark in your work emails, isn’t the end of the world.

In fact, I’ve felt more empowered since we’ve embraced our girlhood. I feel more confident to express ideas without the need to say ‘I know this sounds silly’ or the dreaded, ‘If you know what I mean’. I don’t feel embarrassed when I wear pink! Sometimes I don’t want to make a nice dinner, so microwaved noodles and air-fried nuggets will pass and you don’t have to feel like you’re failing because it’s girl dinner!

Sometimes I don’t want to go for a walk, but calling it a ‘hot girl walk’ gives me a bit of motivation. Being a ‘sad girl’ is much more enjoyable than just being a bit weepy because the dog died in the film. And why shouldn’t we feel empathy?

Is it because we’ve been conditioned to think that only men are serious? Unfortunately, society is going to look down at things that women and girls think are important whether that be music or books or TV shows or the way we dress. If something is popular with women or especially teenage girls, it somehow becomes less important.

I know that girl math and girl dinner and girl whatever else isn’t ‘proper’. I know I should be cooking and budgeting and I am in fact not a teenager, I am in my twenties. These are just silly little jokes. Womanhood is a sisterhood. And it makes me feel content to know that there is a girly whirly across the world who also is doing the exact same things as me and having the exact same thoughts. It doesn’t make us any less intellectual, it just makes us girls.

This article first appeared in the March/April issue of STELLAR