It's okay to love being a girl. It's okay to love yourself just the way you are. Fashion magazines are always telling us we should lose weight or wear different make-up. Our parents are telling us to dress "normal" or just differently. Our friends tell us we should cut our hair, or wear some lipstick. Our boyfriends drop not so subtle hints about our weight, hair style, and choice of friends. We are all perfectly fine just the way we are. There are all sorts of stereotypes that tell us how we should be. It seems that there are so many ways that us girls are supposed to feel. Among the feelings we're supposed to feel, there's inadequate. Unless of course, we have a man. There's dirty, unless of course we're pristine virgins. There's weak, unless of course we have a man behind us (on top of us?). There's useless, unless of course a man wants us (never needs us... we are just girls remember). There's bad. There's silly. There's ugly. There's fat. There's sad. There's stupid.

Well I'm not any of those things. I don't have a man. I'm happy just the way I am. What makes me unhappy is every girl who struggles to be something they're not.

There are girls who think girly-girls are bad. There are girly-girls who think girls who don't shave their legs are icky. There are nice girls who think sexual girls are raunchy. There are sexual girls who think nice girls are frigid. The list goes on and on... us girls, all girls (nice, sexual, girly-girls, nature girls, riotgrrls, even spice girls, etc), have to begin to accept ourselves and each other. We're continually pulling our collectiveness apart. We're supposed to hate each other. At a young age we're taught to hate our mothers, and sisters. At a young age we were taught to hate skinny, pretty girls, and hate being fat, and ugly. So no matter what side of the fence we're on we're supposed to hate whoever is on the other. That has to stop.

We have to accept ourselves, we have to stop striving for a picture of what we think we're supposed to be, and just be. We have to accept each other. We have to start loving each other. Girl love isn't necessarily about homosexuality. It's about loving yourself. It's about loving all girls. This is about loving the being a girl part too.

[this article kind of goes along with what I wrote above, it was  reprinted without permission from the zine Tennis and Violins by Kristy Chan. I tried to email her to ask her permission and never got a reply. I hope she isn't mad that I did]

~ treating all girls with respect
~ hugging your girlfriends and being there for them
~ protecting each other and providing a feeling of safety when we walk down the street or go out
~ making space where women/girls feel unthreatened and unintimidated
~ talking about abuse and rape when no one else will listen
~ making other girls feel unafraid to eat in public or around others
~ making other girls feel comfortable in their bodies
~ being kind to your mom and not expecting her to wait on you
~ not judging women/girls on their looks and/or hating them for being pretty
~ not competing for boys' attention
~ not looking/acting dumb on purpose so boys will like you
~ not picking your new boyfriend over your old girlfriends
~ calling people on their shit, including your girlfriends because it helps us to stay aware of things we do that are fucked up and things we need to change
~ not feeling homophobic around your girlfriends and refusing to touch them
~ learning and teaching each other how to do stuff and be active
~ screaming in public
~ knowing that girls can do anything boys can do
~ stopping jealousy
~ realizing that girls who have sex aren't "sluts" or bad and respecting their sexual choices as something that you might not understand of have any business speculating on
~ being pro-choice
~ knowing that you are connected to all girls and the way you view yourself is related to their self-image as well
~ sharing resources with other girls
~ helping each other see our beauty and build our own culture around what we see
~ wearing make-up and tight clothes because we want to
~ being sexy and powerful
~ being honest and straight-forward with your girlfriends because mind games suck and keep us divided
~ talking about our feelings
~ holding hands
~ feeling okay about being naked around each other
~ having sex and making out (if you want to) and liking it
~ understanding that girls that we may not like are people, too and are affected by the same institutions that affect all of us
~ not letting the words "feminist", "slut", "whore", "bitch", etc. be used as insults against us
~ refusing to let companies prey on our insecurities in order to get our money (how many times have you bought some low-fat diet shit because you feel insecure about your body or bought make-up to hide your face that you think isn't pretty?)
~ trying to understand how oppression and the status quo work and how we fit into it
~ reclaiming our customs and rituals (hanging out in the bathroom, slumber parties, shopping, the color pink, whatever we fucking want)
~ self-love