What I Learned From #LikeAGirl

The Superbowl is over and the hoopla over the game, the scandal about deflated balls (tee hee) and Katy Perry’s killer half-time performance are dying down. I don’t give two shits about football. I’m a card carrying super fan of Team Buffalo Cheese Dip and Team I Love Commercials.

There has been a ton of activity in the media about #LikeAGirl. If you haven’t heard about it go to YouTube or any search engine…that, or crawl back under whatever rock you’ve been hiding under and go to sleep.

Honestly, I didn’t think much about the impact of the #LikeAGirl campaign. I consider myself a feminist and I’m all for any initiative that builds confidence in young women. But, this is 2015, not 1955 or even 1993. We’re evolved, right? There are virtually no limits to what a woman can do these days. We’re kicking ass, taking names and shattering that glass ceiling. I don’t need to watch a commercial for maxi-pads to reaffirm that girls are strong and powerful.  

Or do I?

The first time I watched #LikeAGirl, I thought “oh, that’s sweet.” It’s a three minute feel-good video clip about young people taking a hard look at gender stereotyping. It was even a little enlightening about how a girl’s self-esteem dips during puberty. But, I smiled and shrugged it off. Women are strong. Everyone knows that. Sure, gender bias hasn’t been eradicated from the planet like Smallpox but #LikeAGirl is clever marketing more than anything else. Whatever helps sell those maxi-pads, right?

Wrong. I think I’m part of the problem and that’s hard to admit.

I’m a modern, enlightened woman. I can hold my own in a footrace and in the board room. I’m sucky at throwing a baseball but that’s because I don’t try that hard to be good at throwing, not because of my chromosomal makeup. But, over the past few days, I’ve found myself saying and accepting the kind of things that #LikeAGirl was set in motion to combat.

I was at a corporate breakfast last week. I was going through the food line with a male colleague who dished up a plate of fruit with a dollop of yogurt instead of the heartier offering of scrambled eggs and hash browns.

“Why are you eating chick food?” This came out of my mouth. Yes, I said that.

My coworker grinned sheepishly and launched into detailed explanations about cholesterol levels and love handles. He didn’t appear particularly phased by my commentary on his breakfast but what I said caused someone to feel they had to make excuses for making a healthy food choice.

A couple days later, I was catching up with an old friend over a beer. As we exchanged updates on family life, I asked after his 21 year old daughter.

“Oh, we finally married her off,” he said. We laughed and the conversation rolled forward.

Yesterday, I was swapping office prank stories with my boss. I told her about the time someone punked me by making a scarecrow from a trash bag of shredded paper and an old coat. This “intruder” was sitting it in my office chair for me to find as I arrived at my office in the morning.

“I flipped on the light and I thought there was a guy hunched over in my chair! It scared the crap out of me and I screamed like a little girl!”  If I wanted to be completely honest, I would tell you that I didn’t say “screamed like a bitch” only because I was speaking with my boss. 

I’m not proud of myself. I didn’t think about the meaning behind the things I said in the moment, but these words came back to me when I was doing my end of week mental replay. I guess the #LikeAGirl message had stuck in my subconscious enough to cause me to go back and dissect some of the things that had come out of my mouth. Innocent words that weren’t meant to hurt and probably didn’t. But peel back another layer and what I said and what I laughed at weren’t innocent. People like me are the reason #LikeAGirl is necessary in the world we live in.

1. Food choices don’t make you feminine or masculine.
2. Joking about marrying your daughter off like she’s some chattel isn’t cool. It might seem benign but would you say the same about your twenty-something year old son? I doubt it.
3. Screaming because you’re afraid doesn’t mean you’re weak.

I know all these things but what if I’m part of the problem? I always thought I was part of the solution. I want that to be true but I don’t think it is. I think I have a ways to go.

To all of you out there who think the #LikeAGirl message was stating the obvious, I say maybe the obvious needs to be stated. Foot stomped. Shouted from the rooftops, or, as we do in 2015 blast it all over social media. Maybe that obvious message isn’t so obvious.

Will I slip up and say something I shouldn’t or laugh at something that really shouldn’t be considered funny anymore? Probably. Am I more aware? Definitely.

Times are changing. The maxi-pad people have this one right.