I innocently opened up iTunes on Wednesday, March 8, in search of a new and exciting movie to watch. However, I was surprised by the screen I saw before me.
On the “Movies” page, there was no longer a header reading “New Releases” but instead several headers reading: “Act ‘Like a Girl’”, “Fight ‘Like a Girl’”, “Direct “Like a Girl””, “Write ‘Like a Girl’”, “Lead ‘Like a Girl’”, “Live ‘Like a Girl’”, and “Laugh ‘Like a Girl’”.
I know that this temporary alteration on my iTunes page was Apple’s ode to International Women’s Day, which takes place on the eighth of March every year. However, it got me thinking: What does it mean to do something “like a girl”? What does that even suggest in this day and age?
Perhaps Apple thought it was a power move to change their headers to titles like these, but I simply found it infuriating. I do not know what Apple implied by referring to the featured acting, fighting, directing, writing, leading, lives, and laughter as girl-like, but to me it seemed somewhat insulting. What qualities classified these actions as “Like a Girl”? Sure, they are performed by women in films that feature women, but I strongly feel that that’s all there is to it.
The films featured were not strictly feminine films. They featured just as many men as women, and just as much violence and gore as romance. They were not exclusively ‘chick flicks’ or ‘rom coms’. They were just films. Films which just so happen to feature strong women in a multitude of ways.
So no, the films were not what insulted me. The femininity was not what insulted me. The words were what insulted me.
I would like to go on record saying that I am, by no means, an extreme feminist. In fact, for the majority of my life, I was what many might call a girly girl. I grew up in a pink bedroom, wearing big tutus to ballet class and playing with Barbie dolls.
As I grew older, I grew out of ballet and dolls. I wear more black than pink, play video games with my brother, enjoy action films just as much as, if not more than, rom-coms, and spend most of my time hanging out with guys. But I’m still a girl, and I can still be pretty girly.
I'll be the first to admit that I like glitter and gems. I wear makeup. I love getting dressed up, curing my hair, and putting on heels. If you want to call me girly for that, I won’t be insulted by the term. I am who I am, and I am a girl.
I dress like a girl. I look like a girl. However, I will put my foot down if someone says that my actions are explicitly those of a girl.
How can one write like a girl? How can one direct like a girl? How can one laugh like a girl? How can one live like a girl?
How is a girl’s writing different from a boy’s? How can you tell a girl’s directing from a boy’s? In what ways do girls laugh at different things? How do they live in different ways?
If I handed you a book at random and asked you if the author was a male or female, could you answer with certainty? No.
If I sat you in front of a screen and played a film for you that you had never seen nor heard of, then asked you the gender of the director, you would have a 50% chance of being right. You would also have a 50% chance of being wrong.
If I put a group of blindfolded men and women in a room and had a professional comedian tell a series of jokes, would the comedian explicitly receive laughs from one gender and not the other? No.
If I gave you the straightforward biography of a modern individual, regardless of gender, it would read similarly. We are all born, we live, we grow, we prosper, we work, we accomplish, we smile, we laugh, we cry, we die. Sure, there is room for flexibility and individuality, but gender does not define our lives.
So yes, I am a girl. I look like a girl, sound like a girl, and dress like a girl—these things make sense, seeing as I am a girl. But I will not be told that my actions are those explicitly of a girl. The path I choose for my life is not defined by my gender.
