Before anyone goes ahead assuming anything, this isn’t your regular quintessential callout for gender equality in this brooding world of male superiority and chauvinism towards the astounding capability and strength of the female gender. I’m sorry, but it’s not.

It’s been a long time coming, seeing almost every girl I know advocating this pretentious poster of female empowerment that actually just makes you look like bandwagoning fools, if I may say so bluntly, but not quite so regretfully.

Alright, if Miley Cyrus dyes her armpit hair pink and uploads a very intimate picture of it on Instagram, claiming this is her ‘contribution’ to the engendering of female individuality, it does not make it the new poster for your dignity as a girl. If an unfortunate hormonally imbalanced adolescent has facial hair that’s long enough to be called a beard and she’s grown to accept it, and is spotlighted as someone who takes gender ‘equality’ into orbit is an illusion that the Internet mustered from her condition. If you’ve been treading along this path blindly, following these trends that you assumed represented the awestriking possibilities of what your gender is capable of, you need someone to run you down with a steaming hot cup of black coffee right this second because honey, all that glitters is gold is just a misinterpreted analogy.

I’m a very demonstrative feminist, and by that, I mean the kind of feminist that makes her presence known by the integrity with which she walks and deals with those of her and the opposite gender, from the tiniest things like carrying a chair for my own self by refusing help from a boy, to declaring my indignation when teachers use phrases degrading the potential of girls to deride a boy. But, with every ounce of pride and armour propre that I relinquish with being a girl, I do not attempt at imitating the male gender. I do not walk broad shouldered to rave about my strength. I do not snicker to validate the profoundness of my sense of humour. I do not keep my emotions inclusive to show my durability in situations, except when the situation desperately calls for it, because that is a human instinct, not an exclusive feature of any one gender.

All because I believe in female empowerment and not the surrogating of male characteristics in a perfectly able female, the latter of which the whole world is advocating agonisingly quantitatively, much to my despair.
If you’re a tomboy and all of these habits are basically hardwired into your personality, then that’s an honest and valid lifestyle because, most importantly, it comes with being your own self and not because you’re expediting yourself to prove a point that people will never end up appreciating.

The internet works wonders; it can assuage your twenty first century twitching with movements that make you elude on common sense and join the greater crowd moving towards an illusion that ends in confusion. And I suppose the Internet is what’s making our feminism grow weaker by the hour, as much as it impersonates to be uplifting it.

It all starts with one woman thinking that the best way to empower herself against those snickering drunkards who deride her on the basis of her gender is to start ‘being like them.’ She posts a long sentimental note on her social account and lo and behold, the likes and shares begin. They grow; each day bringing another frustrated woman to her fellow woman’s aid in rebuilding her identity, praising her for ‘challenging’ herself and reclaiming the respect that’s rightfully hers, which it is but not in the ways she believes it is. The post goes viral and girls around the world are shouting out to this amazing woman who was too overcome with adrenaline to realise that acting like she can lift 50 kilos in a heartbeat makes her seem greater than her real self that probably couldn’t do this on any regular Friday is plain sad because what she doesn’t know is that she does not need the approval and the evident shock on the faces of those same men that chided her, to feel powerful, dignified and beautiful. She can be herself, if this isn’t really who she is. She can wince under all that weight, she can wear makeup if that’s what she prefers, she can read as many books as she wants if she doesn’t like to go outdoors, she can go hike as many mountains as she can if becoming a doctor isn’t what aspires her, she can eat tacos all day if she can’t cook. She is not obligated to change herself in any way if that makes her lose even a bit of her individuality every time she puts her habits aside to mollify the standards that she’s scaled against because this is what feminism is. Accepting yourself and accepting every other woman out there who feels like she’s drowning in the ocean of fear of being teased, of being harassed, of being molested, of being disrespected, of being flawed, of being called ‘not enough’ or ‘not beautiful’, of being miscalculated and above all, of being rejected by society because suddenly, all the rules for passing into Girl Land are more important than the reality of simply being a girl. There are so many compromises and some of them are just plainly necessary but don’t compromise to the point where you yourself are letting yourself down. It won’t be all sunshine and butterflies being you, but you can’t always fight a blame battle.

Feminism is inborn and integrated into the flaws that consolidate the sands that make you a woman. And that can be in any regular mom rushing to get the groceries, because that’s what she’s committed herself to and NOT what she’s been pushed into. And studying harder than boys to get into Ivy League colleges and trying extra hard at job interviews does not mean you’re oppressed.

It’s frustrating to see how overrated this topic has become because I honestly can rarely ever find someone who actually understands what sort of blasphemous form of feminism they’re posting about and sharing on this brainless internet, because mostly, every girl is clicking in agreement to some brainwashed forgery but is waywardly silent when it comes to actually speaking up for themselves.

Yes, the world is unjust. Yes, you’re judged and questioned a thousand times a day because you’re a girl but this is just clockwork, and showing your aggression to how no one judges men when they don’t shave but holler at women when their arms aren’t waxed is ridiculous because all you’re calling for is a catfight, when all you need to do is make peace with the struggles you have to face and the package that comes with being you.

At the end of the day, all that matters is that you’re smart, intelligent, beautiful and capable if you work towards it positively.

Oh, and if we’re treated unjustly, then so are the men, in ways that most hardly fathom in their own race to pit our genders against each other and see who humiliates the other the worst.

I don’t think I’d even be writing anything about what I feel empowers me as a girl and establishes my dignity today if it weren’t for the fact that so many of our fellow ladies are losing their self esteem and honour by caving into these trends of not doing things that girls need to do, like combing their hair.

I mean, why wouldn’t you brush your hair, haven’t you ever heard of knots?