The Problem with "Girl's Girl".

I live in fear of not living up to this standard that I'm not sure even exists. I'll start at the start, and use an allegory from a recent gym experience to explain why.

Firstly, women are discriminated against, misogyny is real and the patriarchy exists in both major institutions, and smaller nooks and crannies, across the land. That is that.

Secondly I admire many women that I know first hand, and many from beyond screens and articles. The women I admire don’t seem to have much in common, so I can't say there is a specific “type” other than I am constantly inspired by, and in an awe of many.

Just some of the women I admire. From left to right Michelle O’Neill, Patti Smith, Lilly Allen, Imelda May, Sinead O’Connor, Bernadette Devlin. A range of women from a range of backgrounds - if you don’t know some of them, or their stories - look them up!

However, when it comes to feminism, I find some of the rhetoric to be troublesome. Take the term “Girl’s girl”. A good thing, right? Well, maybe NO, NOT RIGHT. I live in fear of not living up to what I’m pretty sure is a fallacy - that I’m somehow doing the sisterhood wrong by just being.

I attend a gym class that hails itself as “the hardest workout in the world”. While I don’t know how true that is (I have spied through steamy glass doors some acts of sadism going on in Cross Fit settings) what I can tell you is that it’s not easy. A few weeks ago:

1. I spied an ostensibly pregnant lady doing it, keeping up and smiling along, adjusting as she needed to, cool as you like. Me (not pregnant) one chest to floor burpee away from calling for resuscitation. I thought two things: I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt that her decision to train is medically sound, and secondly bloody brilliant for you, presuming you’ve had all health checks. Bloody brilliant.

2. After, another lady discovered that she had had her coat stolen from the changing room while we were in class. She was upset. I gave her my jumper as it was cold and she just had a thin top on to wear home without her coat. She took my number, said she would text me to arrange the return of my jumper later.

   Incidentally, when receiving news of the theft, the receptionist said, with a sigh, shaking his head: “This only ever happens in the women’s changing rooms. Never the men’s”

3. This lady to whom I loaned my jumper never called. My jumper is gone. It was a good jumper.

So who, if we are going to speak in terms of “girl’s girls”, is the girl that we model ourselves to belong to, in the above story, because they all exist. Is it the lady growing a tiny human, training hard? The version of me who silently championed her? The version of me who teetered on deciding that her decision to train might not be sensible? The girl who sneaked in to steal a strangers coat? Was she desperate and cold? Or did she just want it for herself? The girl who was the victim of the coat thief? The version of her that hasn’t returned my jumper? The version of me that gave her my jumper in the first place? The version of me that is now pissed off that I did? These girls all exist, in all their flawed glory.

Girl’s girl, and other terms thrown about like it, are at best restrictive to women and at worst weaponised against them. They don’t afford us nuance. It is just another one dimensional mould for us to fit into.

Here is a further selection of non-stories (non-allegories!) of a similar genre. Just stuff that happened not just to me, but to plenty of others like me:

The all-girls secondary school that I attended as an adolescent offered only double award science at GCSE level - the boys in the adjoining building were offered triple award. This was a limiting factor for admissions to some degree courses. This is the same school that prayed over a pregnant Michelle O’Neill, who has gone on to become First Minister of Northern Ireland. (I had a great time at school personally - but it is a point of note).

I have 2 brothers, and 0 sisters and grew up only ever getting to play goalkeeper or umpire in the garden. To be fair I am, ahem, not a natural athlete, but I never was given, or seized opportunity, to practise to improve - a good early lesson on equity Vs equality.

I worked in a job where it was often assumed that I was the CEO’s wife, and not a professional of my own standing.

I’ve been offered mediocre jobs with mediocre terms and conditions, sold to me as being “good for a woman at your stage of life….you know, settling down”, insinuating that I would soon be bearing children.

I recognise sexism - most often benign, but sometimes malignant. But here comes the controversial bit - a lot of the time, it comes from women, without them knowing it.

Judging others choices. Seeking each others approval of our own choices, upset if we don’t get it. Wanting what they have. Being suspicious of their motives. Unforgiving of their mistakes or perceived shortcomings.

She looks well. She’s too skinny. She looks awful. She looks tired. She loves herself. She’s only out for herself. She’s too ambitious, cut throat. She had a boob job. What a slut. How desparate. Who does she think she is. She hates kids. She didn’t breast feed. She breast fed for too long. She dumps her kids with the nanny. She’s obsessed by her kids. She has a cleaner! Shes not very nice. I wouldn't cross her. She is a bit much. She put her father in a care home. Career woman. She married up. She married down. Bitch. That wouldn’t be good enough for her. Double barrelled wanker. She’s too old to be wearing that. She’s gone woo-woo. She has let herself go. She went back to work too soon. She thinks she’s better than us. She’s mad. She’s just not a girl’s girl.

I’m not being all worthy - I recognise my own thought patterns in the above, as well as what I imagine what has been said about me at times. I think it is something of human nature that when any of us encounter one whose choices are so remote to our own that we reject them. We see safety in the familiar or in what we can recognise, and suspicious of what we can’t. It takes a bit of work to think it out, fathom an alternative preference. But these examples are all born out of expecting women to be a certain way: nice, homemakers, carers, second in command, the property of another, motherly, altruists, pretty, slim. And if she demonstrates anything that appears to deviate from that, its open season on her, and all this lexicon so readily exists to select a term of denigration from.

Feminism, or my preferred brand of, isn’t about being anti-men, adopting a herd mentality against them. It’s about being pro-women - their choices, their lifestyles. It’s not “burn the patriarchy”, because that is no more evolved than “boys are stupid, throw things at them”. Imelda May, an Irish singer/songwriter/poet, and a fantastic woman, wrote a poem “YOU DON’T GET TO BE RACIST AND IRISH”. I don’t know how true that statement is, especially lately, but I’d draw parallels and say you don’t get to judge other women, and be feminist. It is about building a woman up to a place that when she recognises anyone who is keeping her small, that she can confidently challenge them. To redress power imbalance when faced with it. To stand up, set a precedent so that others can stand up when their time comes. And picking her up if she can’t or doesn’t.

When I think harder about the women whom I admire I see that they maybe do have something in common. Thinking specifically of those in the public eye whom are recognisable, they are brave and outspoken, often irreverent and unashamed, but sometimes quietly so, challenging those who consume their art to think. They are talented and wonderful enough to catch the ear and eye of the world, but don’t quite fit the template of what that same world expects them to be.

Candace Bushell, the writer of Sex and the City recently did a magazine interview where she talked about her new book. She talked about reinventing herself later in life, and how she feels like she is constantly changing. I liked that - the idea that there is room for all versions of ourselves. We are complex and nuanced and have different backgrounds and upbringings and encounters that will shape current and future iterations of us. This one ideal of “girl’s girls” seems to mean “decent person”, and most of us are so, so much more that just that.

Sorry if it’s ranty.

Until next week when a round up from fashion month is coming your way…

Big Love

Una

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