Dear girls of the world today...

Oh my.

Thank you. I want to print this out for my nieces. I want to put it on a poster in 72 pt bold font and stare at it until it is ingrained in my own adult brain and I believe it myself, not just in my head to be reminded, but in my heart where it will not be shouted down by the voices outside and in. I want my nieces to not have to deal with the same issues my mom, sister, and sister in law have had to deal with because of skewed gender expectations. Thank you for lighting one more candle against the darkness.

It's amazing what a good set of people can do for your attitude. I grew up in a house full of books, with two parents who, despite having come of age in the 50s (and early 60s, but that's still 50s in terms of culture), had no trouble understanding that there is nothing lesser about being female. My dad taught me how to use power tools and would brush my (then) long hair. My mom—paleontology geek from the age of nine in Wyoming, where you could actually get a pretty decent hands-on time—taught me about dinosaurs to the point where I can still identify a number of them on sight, and can come up with most of an alphabet of them without Google. (Allosaurus, Brachiosaurus, Carnotaurus, Deinonychus...) I was in Girl Scouts but wished I could be in Boy Scouts and actually got my wish when I got hired at a BSA summer camp. There was some casual misogyny (mostly from one source) but a determined effort to ignore it meant that I could really mess with people's heads when I wanted to. (Conservative Mormon troop leader asks what major I'm pursuing. "Engineering." Internal amusement as you could see him trying to reconcile that with his views of what's appropriate while not saying anything rude.)(Incidentally, decided against engineering in the long run but got enough to understand some pretty nifty physics concepts.)

Anyway. I've seen far too many of my friends have self-esteem issues and body-image issues and all I can say is, cut that crap out of your life. Cancel the magazines—studies have shown that just seeing the Photoshopped models makes women feel worse about themselves. Don't watch the shows that promote the bad images of women, nor the commercials that come with them. Kick butt and take names however you want to.

And look forward to the day when they stop using the phrase "strong female character." You don't have "strong female characters," Ms. McGuire, you have strong protagonists. Period.

I love you.

Thank you.

This is beautiful and I'd like to repost it.

I had to share, so I did, with a link back, on my LJ and Tumblr.

Thanks for including the trans women. So many people don't.

Thank you so much for writing this. I wish I had read it, or something like it, when I was a girl.

Is it okay if I repost this?

Thank you.
I love you.

Thank you for this. When I was small, my parents had a hard time trying to instill this in me when the rest of the world...and most of my family...was doing the opposite.
I have clicked the share button so that my f-list can read it too, hope that's OK.

I love your brain! Thanks so much for sharing this.

Cute, thank you. ^^

I love being able to coo over snakes and hold the door for other people while wearing skirts and long hair. Xp

I really adore you, you know? Sharing everywhere I can.

Word. I have given up hope on being a proper girl and doing all the things that I should. I have way more fun being me. As my old DofE supervisor said, I'm an 'unconventional girl'.

'Conventional' girls probably aren't allowed to get excited about bad SF action films and not having those would make me sad. And it would put lots of mediocre actors/writers out of work.

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Came from Metaquotes, and have seen permission to repost, so I plan to.

But is it okay to distribute in the 'real world'? I'm a speech therapist at a 4th/5th-grade school, and the 6th-grade school next door. I'd like to print it out, put a copy in the teachers' mailboxes, and encourage them to make copies and distribute to the girls.

Forgot to say -- thank you so much for writing / posting this. It's sad that it still needs to be said, but it, and you, are made of win.
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This is amazing. :-) thank you for posting it. <3

I wish every girl could read this.

Beautiful post! I especially like how you emphasized that girls should like what they want to like, whether it's super girly or not.

Also, I had no idea that pink used to be a masculine color. That really cracks me up. :)

Wow! Thank You!

May I share this with all the young women I know?

Just had to add to the "awesome post" chorus. I'm so glad I started using LJ again and found your blog. Not only do your books rock, you rock. :D