I used to be an avid fan of the Spice Girls, along with the entirety of my generation’s female portion.
Even though Ginger was my ultimate favorite, the whole gang was spectacular to fifth-grade me– they were fearless, powerful, independent, ambitious, and they had a penchant for glitter that has yet to be matched by any musical artist since.
More than anything else, however, they supported “girl power,” an absolutely ludicrous idea that females should support each other loyally and unite together in the face of a supposedly male-dominated world of cutthroat competition, furtive manipulation, and outright fabrication and deceit.
Weirdly enough, it seems that the only individuals capable of such items towards girls are girls themselves.
To quote one of my favorite people ever in one of my favorite movies ever, “It looks like there’s been some girl-on-girl crime here.”
I believed in this notion of girl power, of divine sisterhood, if you will, until the second semester of my sophomore year, in which I somehow found myself facing the girl who’s boyfriend of almost two years had been in my bedroom barely a week before, who’s text messages filled my inbox, and who’s DVDs filled a shelf on my desk. No, she had not invited me to have lunch with her to cause me bodily harm (although due to the fact that she’s a good head taller than me, I wouldn’t have blamed her for thinking about dropping me to the ground with one punch and calling it a day), or even to publicly humiliate me in the Bell Tower by yelling obscenities at my person (I’m sure that stage had already happened privately).
She had invited me to lunch so we could talk. So we could properly introduce ourselves. So we could end all social awkwardness. So we could sort out all the lies he had clearly told both of us. So we could both decide that we were better than him. So we could even maybe, sort of, a little bit, be friends, even though we had both effectively dated the same person for the same two or three months.
Naive as I was, I spilled all, laid down all of my power cards, gave away secrets apparently he had only told me, and let my guard down enough to even answer her most probing questions about my life, in general. I mean, after all, we were both girls! We were in this together! We were both highly intelligent, smart, ambitious, attractive young women! He had done us wrong! We were better off without him! We were even maybe going to go shopping for boots and watch all of his DVD’s together! Also, I mentioned that she was certifiably taller than me and that I’m not particularly athletic, right?
I can sill paraphrase so many manipulative statements– “I guess I kind of ‘won,’ but I really sort of lost because I have to deal with him? We’re still best friends, you know?” or “I always kind of considered you his second girlfriend. Is that weird?” or “But you seem so put-together. Why would you even put up with him, of all people?”
And so it became obvious eventually, that after our conversation, she had clearly continued dating this person, clearly told him everything I said and used it against him, and clearly, I was seriously dumb. We never went shopping, we never watched movies, and we never became friends, although there was a period when I came back from my semester abroad (where I maniacally hoped I’d come back to find her and this boy married, because then finally I’d have to just get the fuck over the whole situation) where she tried to pretend she was genuinely interested in me as a human being and not as the walking, talking, cowboy-boot-wearing alleged reason why her relationship was still less than satisfactory.
To this day, I put on the loud, unabashedly rambunctious and ridiculous persona of the homewrecking dirty mistress she believes I am and proceed to get rapidly drunk while in her presence at parties. At press time, I’ve not gotten harmed, although if looks could kill, I would be gasping of knife wounds in intensive care. At least we’re civil, right?
But I am not necessarily blame-free either– I, for one, absolutely cannot stand Ellen Page.
The mere mention of her would send me into some sort of half-formatted string of insults followed by some un-evidenced tirade and general defamation of her as a human being. Seriously. I get worked up.
It’s not because there is something inherently ungraceful or untalented about her acting ability, it’s not because I find some problem with her life philosophy or her career choices, and it’s not because I want her boyfriend, or because I believe she took mine. Plain and simple, I’m jealous.
A slightly elitist 21-year-old petite brunette with big brown eyes, a love for garage bands, and a deadpan, sarcastic, slightly snarky style? Wow. Sounds kind of familiar, minus the fact that I’m not actually in any way Ellen Page, nor probably could I be, but the fact remains that she’s on the cover of magazines kissing Drew Barrymore and I am not. (There’s also that whole thing about her being Canadian, but whatevs.)
It may sound ridiculous to use my example as a celebrity, but it’s the same amount of energy being completely and utterly wasted. And if physics has taught me anything, it’s that energy can not be created or destroyed, just changed in form over and over again– in no way do I want all of that negativity haunting my life, thanks.
With all of this being said, I’ve been lucky to accrue 1528 and a certain bespectacled amiga (who recently has provided a clear friendship benefit with the adoption of her dog), and I don’t think my unconditional love for the four other girls in this house is something that anyone is really questioning the strength of, so that’s that.
I will turn over a new leaf, though, and admit, begrudgingly, that I thoroughly enjoyed ‘Juno,’ a movie I claimed to have boycotted since its release, but which I finally viewed this summer.
As for the Spice Girls, the spunky Englanders may now be having Eddie Murphy’s babies and releasing strange solo efforts and posing as fashion 
muses to Marc Jacobs and whatnot, but their message is still true.
It just would have been nice if we girls wouldn’t have ditched the ‘girl power’ mantra when we abandoned the trading cards and the Chupa Chup lollipop collector tins.
I mean, after all, platforms are totally making a comeback. Yeah, platforms.
We’ve really got no excuse.
– A
fifteentwentyeight 