Girls Rule!!

The other day I saw a woman on the train wearing a bright pink lanyard, and on it were the words, Girls Rule!! Presumably the exclamation points were there to ensure we got the point. Got it. Girls rule. I’m a little confused, though. While some men will say that their wives do indeed rule the house, I’m not really sure what that statement means.

It’s a manifestation, I guess, of the Girl Power phenomenon which supposedly was a term of empowerment, popularized in the 1990s by the British band, The Spice Girls.

Even the Oxford English Dictionary added the term in 2001 and defined it as:

Power exercised by girls; spec. a self-reliant attitude among girls and young women manifested in ambition, assertiveness and individualism…

I'm all for female ambition, assertiveness and indiviudalism, but humility is also a worthy trait. If girls rule, then apparently they also kick ass. At least that’s the conclusion one could draw from the t-shirts emblazoned with that particular slogan. I’ve seen others that say Canadian Girls Kick Ass. Nice. And what’s the message?

This all reminds me of the schoolyard in grade school when some whiny girl, who probably had trouble making friends, would call out in an annoying voice, “girls are better than boys, girls are better than boys!”

“Right you are, now can you scram, so we can continue flicking hockey cards against the school wall.”

Like people who put Canadian flags on their backpacks, where does this insecurity come from? Maybe I’m wrong, but surely all women don’t associate with the Girls Rule mantra. Seems to me that if you need to wear t-shirts and accessories telling people how great you are—you’re probably not.