I was having a conversation with a staff member at my current client (they hired me despite the 'Unisexer' debacle - long story short, MS Word decided that UniSuper, a previous client, was not a word, but that 'Unisexer' was. So it went and replaced every instance of UniSuper in my proposal. And yet I was still hired...) and I referred to myself as a girl.
The guy in question was relieved as he had been about to use the word 'girl' in a sentence, but was afraid of offending me.
It struck me then how I resent the fact that 'girl' has become a victim of political correctness.
I am a girl, dammit. I have girly bits. I do girly things. Hell, my blog even has pink on it!
I LIKE being a girl.
'Female' sounds so removed and 'woman' sounds so formal and grown up (and if anyone was to describe me, I'm fairly confident that the words 'formal' and 'grown up' would not appear).
For me, 'girl' represents all the things that I am. I don't feel it is in the slightest bit demeaning, although I know it can be intended that way.
I want to take 'girl' back. Like African Americans owning 'nigger' and gays taking back 'queer', I want to be a 'girl' again.
I am strong, I am invincible, I am girly!
"A girl is the word
A girl is a verb
A girl is the world..."
'Girl' - Frente
While I have no problem with women referring to themselves and others as girls when there's proper context, I'm irritated by people who witter on about someone I don't know and having to ask if the "girl" in question is 11 (in which case: yes, her behaviour is shocking) or 40 (in which case: why are you boring me with this story?)
And, yes, I *do* know someone who does this fairly regularly.
I think "girl" is good; I hate "lady"... grr what an awful word.
I think we (the female half of the species) have the prerogative of calling oneself a girl if we want to - but other people referring to us as such, especially in a formal or professional context would be damn cheeky an d patronising.
Yep yep. Even my nickname ......... craftygirl
I'm a girl too!
Some people can get so hung up trying not to hurt people's feelings. just say what you mean and we wil tell you if we were offended or not.
Girl Power! I always describe myself as a girl too. Maybe that's why my Mum still doesn't think I'm old enough to have kids even at almost 33. And I tend to agree with her, heh.
(hey there's someone really obsessed by poker commenting up there!!!???!!!)
Personally I was always dying to shift out of girlhood into wymnynishness. . . .
and I really find it weird when my soon-to-be 70 year old dad talks about *ANY* woman younger than him - even by only amonth or two! - as a girl . . . this (*AHEM*65 year old*AHEM*) girl he was chatting with blah blah...
but I'm cool with grrrrrrl
go grrrrrrrrrrrl goooooooo! :-P
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I could not agree with this blog more!... By big sister is definately a girl... and I never want her to grow into a woman (unless of course she wants to!). It's far more fun being girly than "womanly" anyway!!
Yooray for my girly sis!!