Just a Girl
By: Nayomika Shashidhar
Edited by: Fiorina Siamir
You’ve heard the phrase, ‘I’m just a girl. Why do I have to deal with this?’ countless times, I’m sure, with the trend circulating on social media. You may be wondering what it means, given that it implies no meaning other than that the status of ‘girl’ seems to absolve the person of any responsibility. There has been a recent uptick in the number of trends involving the ‘girls’, including girl maths, girl dinner and more, and what do they all have in common? In short, they all point to girls being only one thing: bimbos.
Well, it’s mostly only girls making these self-deprecating jokes about themselves, essentially calling themselves dumb or unaware of essential practices and everyday tasks around them. That should be enough to understand that the trend is entirely ironic; nobody believes that girls don’t know or shouldn’t know about fundamental and critical tasks like budgeting, taxes, politics and more. Of course, everyone knows everyone should know how to cook, and a “girl dinner” isn’t the norm because she knows how to stay alive.
People know that girls joke about their collective intelligence as a gender ironically and don’t actually believe in their inferiority in gender roles, right? Well, apparently not. There has been a rising tide in people genuinely believing in this narrative, and like it or not, even ironic media can genuinely influence people, especially young, impressionable social media users who hear, day in and day out, that there is no need for them to conduct specific roles such as getting a paid job, and that they are excused from responsibilities solely due to their gender.
The ripple effect created can manifest real desires and fears in young girls, including stereotypes about women in STEM fields, their supposedly inherent maternal and nurturing nature (and biological ‘responsibility’ of having children), and the perpetuation of gender roles that the girl supports their man as a homemaker or housewife. In contrast, men deal with financial responsibility without their partners’ input. Even more so with the rise of stay-at-home girlfriends and tradwives, who generally perpetuate these ideals and more. This trend has created a small but genuine desire in girls to explore no other option other than becoming a housewife (also since it has been described as more low-effort and laid back with lesser responsibility, a false representation of running an entire household by oneself).
People have argued that these trends bring us back to 1950s first-wave feminism. It may be true that gender roles of the past may be resurfacing now in the 2020s, but with one crucial difference: women now have a choice. That being said, it is important to recognise even the subconscious implications of such a trend on young girls and how it can impact their perceptions of gender roles.
Regardless, in today’s economy and state of the world, is reverting to traditional gender roles even an option? Can people support a family, or even themselves, with a single source of income? It increasingly seems that no, it might not be, especially in areas where the cost of living is skyrocketing, such as New York, Singapore and more. A dual income may, unfortunately, be necessary to survive, eliminating this choice altogether. However, if it does occur, the massive reduction in the workforce from more and more women not wanting to take up paid work, alongside ageing populations and low birth rates, would cause an enormous impact on the economy, causing productive capacity to decrease significantly and inevitably decrease countries’ national incomes.
Eventually, it all comes down to a trend on social media. Whether or not it ends up having unintended impacts may be beside the point; the spirit in which it was created was that of joy and camaraderie between girls wanting to share the irony of their status as girls. While recognising the origins, it is also essential to understand its harm, especially when it is filtered through the algorithm multiple times and shown repeatedly to impressionable children. Rather than being ‘just a girl’, it may be time for us to take responsibility for our actions and impact and be careful about how our trends may mutate into worse ideas on the internet.