Dear girls of the world today...: seanan

Dear girls of the world today...

Dear girls of the world today;

There is nothing wrong with you.

Everything I see, everything I read, everything I hear, is geared toward telling you that something is wrong with you. You're too fat. You're too thin. Your skin is terrible. You look too young. You look too old. You're too smart, you're too dumb, you talk too much, you don't talk enough, you're broken, you're flawed, you're bad. And all those things are lies. They are exaggerations. They are designed to pick on the things you feel insecure about, and convince you that you will never be happy unless you force yourself into their standards of perfection.

They will tell you that you are weak; that girls can't deal with spiders or do math or love snakes or run nations or be scientists. They will tell you that you must be indecisive, flighty, more interested in the interests that are chosen for you than the ones that you choose for yourself. They will tell you that you have to change yourself to suit them, and then they will keep moving the goalposts, so that you're never done changing, and you're never allowed to be you. And they are wrong. They are so, so wrong, and you are better than the lies they tell you.

If you are a girl, you are a girl. Period, finish, end statement. It doesn't matter what you look like or what you enjoy doing. It doesn't matter what your assigned birth sex is or was. It doesn't matter who or what or why you love. All that matters is that you love, and that you accept that you are you, and you are awesome.

It's okay if you love pink. Some girls genuinely do. I genuinely do. Once, we would all have been viewed as cross-dressing and weird for liking pink, which was a male color. Times change. If you want to own your own pinkness, do, and don't let anyone tell you that makes you less of a feminist.

It's okay if you hate pink. You're not denying your gender or letting down the side, or anything else like that. You're a person, and there are a lot of colors out there to fall in love with. I recommend orange, green, and anything that sears your retinas.

Frills and lace and high heels and makeup are all fine. So are denim and combat boots and tattoos. So is everything between those extremes.

Collect dolls or knives or books or interesting rocks. Watch horror movies or romances or cartoons. Run races; go to spas. Eat cake or lettuce. Buy yourself a toy light saber and make your own wooooom noises while you wave it around; build a cardboard castle and chuck plush mushrooms at your would-be rescuers. Live your life, the way you want to live it, and understand that no one can kick you out of "the girl club" for doing it wrong, because you're not.

You're doing it exactly right, and I love you for that.

Corn maze love,
Me.

calico_reaction

May 4 2012, 22:27:54 UTC 5 years ago

New comment

You rock.

seanan_mcguire

May 5 2012, 02:10:23 UTC 5 years ago

So do you.

tiferet

May 4 2012, 22:42:10 UTC 5 years ago

I love you so much right now (and generally)...

May 5 2012, 02:10:32 UTC 5 years ago

Aw. Love you, too.

birthingway

May 4 2012, 22:47:25 UTC 5 years ago

Linked to my nine-year-old, who particularly loves to get e-mail. Thank you.

May 5 2012, 02:10:41 UTC 5 years ago

Very welcome.

pirate_nami

May 4 2012, 22:50:13 UTC 5 years ago

I love you and this post! ♥

May 5 2012, 02:10:49 UTC 5 years ago

Thank you!

tabaqui

May 4 2012, 22:59:41 UTC 5 years ago

Really lovely and something i want my daughter to hear and understand.
*here from metaquotes*

May 5 2012, 02:11:00 UTC 5 years ago

Welcome!

elbales

May 4 2012, 23:14:30 UTC 5 years ago

You win all the internets.

May 5 2012, 02:11:11 UTC 5 years ago

I will keep them with my Barbies.

rhoda_rants

May 4 2012, 23:25:16 UTC 5 years ago

*ALL THE HUGS*

You are awesome. Reposting is okay, yes? :)

May 5 2012, 02:11:20 UTC 5 years ago

Yes, absolutely.

mckavian

May 4 2012, 23:39:48 UTC 5 years ago

I need to save this for my 1 yr old. I want to show her this when she is 6, 7, 8, etc...

I will shout this (hence the icon) until she has seared it into her hear.

This will help my daughter be fucking awesome.

Thank you in advance

(and forgive my presumptuousness in believing you'll be OK with my yoinking it)

May 5 2012, 02:11:36 UTC 5 years ago

I am totally okay with it, and you are very welcome.

sylvanas_reborn

May 5 2012, 00:03:03 UTC 5 years ago

LOVE IT. Shared on Facebook. Hopefully one day I can teach my girls EXACTLY THIS.

May 5 2012, 02:11:44 UTC 5 years ago

I hope so, too.

gelsey

May 5 2012, 00:28:14 UTC 5 years ago

Thank you. Some days, especially lately, I really need to hear that.

May 5 2012, 02:11:55 UTC 5 years ago

You are wonderful.

dragonsally

May 5 2012, 01:04:36 UTC 5 years ago

I love you and your words.

May 5 2012, 02:12:02 UTC 5 years ago

Thank you.

supergasnojutsu

May 5 2012, 01:17:19 UTC 5 years ago

Hallelujah and a thousand praises.

I especially like the part about girls being girls. When they're girls. And that that's all they need to be girls. It's so irritating to meet people who are for gender equality but deny certain qualities or characteristics that are too "stereotypical" or "limiting." An individual who is afraid of spiders and feels faint at the sight of blood can be just as strong or weak or smart or dumb as someone who has a pet tarantula and hunts elk. People are people, not just some blob of personality traits.

May 5 2012, 02:12:33 UTC 5 years ago

Totally. And I know guys who are all those things, and are still guys! You get to be YOU, whatever that means.

lunalelle

May 5 2012, 01:23:48 UTC 5 years ago

You are awesome and we love you. Is it all right if I share this on my blog in the future, credited to you, of course?

May 5 2012, 02:12:42 UTC 5 years ago

Absolutely.

kellyjelly33

May 5 2012, 01:27:47 UTC 5 years ago

My little sister is going through some interesting times being a teenager and has some self esteem issues, and that, combined with the fact I know a few other people who also hate themselves a little bit, made me realise something: we, as a society, are not doing a very good job of raising our young. Considering how many body issues people have, both male and female, we're doing something wrong. Sure , I also know people who love themselves and are at peace with themselves but that is the minority, and they're also mostly older, and have worked through all these issues already.
I like reading, gaming, hot pink and black, purple, and red. I read fantasy and science fiction, romance, and I play both computer games, including MMOs and single player RPGs, and pen and paper RPGs. I am at one with my geekiness, my sexual preferences, and my body. I am a woman. I am pretty and smart. And I'm ok with all that. I do wonder though when the rest of the world will be.
Very nice post. Thanks.

May 5 2012, 02:13:08 UTC 5 years ago

No, we're really not doing very well by them. But she has you, and that will help.

Deleted comment

May 5 2012, 02:13:18 UTC 5 years ago

vincentursus

May 5 2012, 01:43:16 UTC 5 years ago

Some days, I want to conquer the world and bring it under my ruthless dominion.

Other days, it seems to be going pretty well the way it is.

Thank you.

May 5 2012, 02:13:27 UTC 5 years ago

effervescent

May 5 2012, 01:43:37 UTC 5 years ago

Ahhh I was just thinking the other day 'I really need to stop commenting all the time because I know that she has to reply to everything', but this? This was so nice to read on my flist today, and you are wonderful. ♥

May 5 2012, 02:13:40 UTC 5 years ago

So are you, dear. :)

baron_waste

May 5 2012, 01:48:32 UTC 5 years ago

And what, then, would you say to boys?

May 5 2012, 02:14:24 UTC 5 years ago

I was never a boy, so I didn't get the pressures they did. But I'd say that many of the same things, if not all, apply to them; I just don't speak from a position of "I used to be you," which undermines my ability to say them with authority.

But a lot of men could. And I wish they would.

5 years ago

peachtales

May 5 2012, 02:05:52 UTC 5 years ago

Lovely. Thank you. *hugs*

May 5 2012, 02:14:31 UTC 5 years ago

*hugs*

falnfenix

May 5 2012, 02:35:46 UTC 5 years ago

...this is getting reposted. everyfuckingwhere.

May 5 2012, 15:45:18 UTC 5 years ago

Whee!

kittylady

May 5 2012, 02:37:16 UTC 5 years ago

I love you so much, and I feel fully vindicated for pestering my friends with copies of your paperbacks until they agree that you are awesome.

That fact that you had to write this at all fills me with a clean and pure rage, the kind that makes a fine red haze appear at the edges of vision and sets the veins in the forehead to pulsing. It sucks so hard, all the time, and sometimes even the effort of shining a light into dark places only makes you a target. It's kind of soul sucking.

But you keep doing it. And that makes you a hero, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

May 5 2012, 15:45:57 UTC 5 years ago

I...I love your icon. I LOVE IT LIKE BURNING.

I hate that these things need to be written. So we just need to keep writing them, until the need is gone.

lit_luminary

May 5 2012, 02:39:16 UTC 5 years ago

If I have a daughter someday, I'm going to read this to her. It's beautiful, and thank you so much!

May 5 2012, 15:46:06 UTC 5 years ago

arysani

May 5 2012, 03:07:46 UTC 5 years ago

You are awesome. Thank you for sharing this.

May 5 2012, 15:46:16 UTC 5 years ago

You are very welcome.

paksenarrion2

May 5 2012, 03:22:50 UTC 5 years ago

When I first started reading your live journal and books, I thought you rocked.

As I continued to read your journal, that changed-I thought you bouldered.

But this? Makes you an entire planet full of win. I decree you Empress of the Planet Seanan.

Your girls, our girls, the girls that should be growing up to be who they are inside and out should become the real women in my icon. Even now, women succumb to societal pressures/media and Hollywood stereotypes to fit into the current mold of what is beautiful, what a "real woman should be". *points to icon*

And the sooner society and Hollywood and the media realize it and stop stereotyping and pressuring them to fit a mold, the better off we will all be.

I will be sharing this post on facebook and telling my friends to re-share with credit. The further this goes viral, the better.

May 5 2012, 15:46:51 UTC 5 years ago

I get a planet? Victory!

And thank you. Very much.

meggins

May 5 2012, 03:56:47 UTC 5 years ago

You're doing it exactly right, and I love you for that.

I love you for saying that, for writihg this post. I hope it reaches those who need to read it.

May 5 2012, 15:47:01 UTC 5 years ago

I do, too.

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