Between the Barbie movie, the Eras tour, and Nebraska women’s volleyball, this summer has redefined how many women view themselves and other women.
When I was really little, I loved pink and all things princess. But then I started to be told by other kids that pink was too girly, and that princesses are crybabies. I started to feel like being girly wasn’t a good thing anymore, so I changed.
I decided I didn’t want to be like other girls. My favorite color became blue. I stopped wearing dresses. I started reading and stopped playing with Barbies. I didn’t want to be girly anymore.
Yet somehow, people still found things wrong. I was too bossy. I was a know-it-all. I was smart “for a girl.” I was basic because I liked Target and Starbucks.
Girls have to deal with comments like this from peers, friends, and the media. Most of the characters I watched growing up who had blonde hair fit the stereotypes and were either mean or dumb. It started to make sense to me that this is all people expected from me.
For a long time, I struggled to feel confident just being myself. However, life kept throwing challenges after me and made me realize that I had to be myself. Maybe I am girly and basic, but those things make me happy, so who cares.
This summer reaffirmed this idea for me.
I watched as women dressed up, went to the Eras concert, and sang their hearts out. Some were mocked for it. There were posts on social media calling women crazy for being so excited and spending so much, but would these same people judge a man for being that excited for the Superbowl? There are reports every year about men who flip cars or punch TVs when their teams win or lose, yet newscasters have judged Taylor Swift fans more for scream-singing at a concert than they judge these men. On top of that, Taylor Swift has broken record after record in the music industry, yet people still say she’s a whiny brat who only sings about her breakups.
The Barbie movie came out with this message that women don’t need to be perfect, that being real is better. However, it was still criticized. People posted on social media saying that this message was stupid, and that the movie spent too much time focused on Barbie. Did people leave Oppenheimer saying the film talked about him too much?
University of Nebraska’s women’s volleyball team set a new world record for the amount of people in attendance for a women’s sport. When people have been saying for years that women’s sports just aren’t exciting. That women will just never play as interestingly as men do. Yet, it seems like the tide is changing. Even in Kansas City, the first women’s sports stadium in the entire world is being built.
This makes me hope that the critics will get quieter. That women enjoying the same thing as other women will stop being a reason to tear someone down. That maybe women will stop being told to give up things that make them happy to appease someone else’s idea of who they should be.
Watching men and women unite on social media over these topics and celebrate them has been overwhelmingly inspiring. It makes me proud to be a part of this generation, and proud to be a girl. So, thank you to the record-breaking women who helped lead the way.
