After years of rejecting femininity for the sake of feminism, young femmes all over the world are finally embracing it. “I’m just a girl” culture along with hyper-feminine fashion and aesthetics have blown up in the last few years, and being a girl has been celebrated more than it ever has before. But, because the internet is the internet, some have taken it a bit too far.
The resurgence of femininity has unfortunately come with many drawbacks, one being the romanticization of domesticity. Many young femmes online have expressed their love for living with their partners and being a “stay-at-home girlfriend” without considering why. The patriarchal values that are taught to us teach us that domesticity is seen as a fundamentally feminine trait, making those who choose to embrace femininity more drawn to it. These “stay-at-home girlfriends” fall into this position under the guise of choice, and while some femmes may want to stay at home and be a caregiver, making it the norm in the name of “feminism” takes us several years into the past. To ignore that it can be dangerous for young women not to have an income and be in control of their lives to fit into an outdated mold of femininity is actively regressing the progress we’ve made.
One of the other factors that affect this regression is, unfortunately, the “I’m just a girl” culture. “I’m just a girl” is a phrase that has blown up within the last few years. Its purpose is to stray away from the girlboss hustle culture of the 2010s, which prioritized corporate success over everything else. This new wave of feminism allows femmes to be people with flaws rather than pillars of success and is obviously not serious, but some people have taken it as such. This phenomenon can be seen especially when “girl math” blew up. Girl math is a phrase used to describe the mental gymnastics femmes do to justify a myriad of things— the most prevalent being spending money. Many people online, usually men, have used this phrase to belittle those who use the phrase, saying things to the effect of “women are stupid” or “women shouldn’t be trusted with money.” Not only have these people missed the inherent unseriousness of the phrase, other femmes have agreed with this rhetoric, adding fuel to the fire.
With every culture, there will be a counterculture, making this powerful reclaim of femininity countered with a deep-rooted culture of hatred for femininity. The truth is that all femmes are intelligent and capable, and trying to fit everyone into a single mold is useless. No matter how someone presents themselves, they are worthy of respect and opportunity. Femininity as a concept is so broad, and in its broadness there is beauty. Trying to narrow it down is harmful to all who claim it.
