How often I hear women slurring the names of other women, calling them b**ches, liars, crazy, trash…and too often do I find myself thinking that these names and this foul gossip is the product of an endless cycle of self-hate.

Women hating on other women is part of an age old system created by men. We must not be a part of the very system that oppresses us. When we look at each other as the enemy, we are further apart from the possible sisterhood that unites us and the possibility of creating a stronger movement towards true equality. Too often do we spend so much time trying to tear one another apart, trying to call each other crazy and dehumanizing one another – discrediting one another of our potentials and inherent bond. I myself am guilty of such the atrocity that is bashing another women out of spite, but it stops here. We must stop perpetuating the patriarchy that we are so entrenched in.

A girl, who when she first meets a new woman, should not automatically think the worst of her. Women, especially young women, tend to find a need to compete with other girls. The reasons for such competition is individual, and at best sourced from a projection of the self. Jealousy, manifestations of ideas of what the other girl may represent, any number of things may cause a girl to take an instant distaste of another – but this must not be so. This is not a commentary on individual personhoods. Do what you will with a person you dislike on reasons that are experienced personally and founded in your interactions – but please do not dislike a girl simply because she is a perceived “threat” of some kind.

We must support each other, love each other, build and lift each other up to our highest possible potentials. When I first look upon the face of a women I do not know, I think “Hello sister. Hello fellow struggler, fellow friend that has existed in this man’s world, one way or another, and has somehow lasted this long. Hello survivor, hello beautiful.”

We must reprogram our girls into this way of thinking. No more immediate, unfounded, unnecessary hate. Living in a society in which we must teach men to simply not rape, you’d think we’d be smart enough to turn to our sisters facing the same ludicrous way of life.

I find comfort in my girlfriends. I love their beautiful, smart faces. I love telling people about how talented, driven, sexy, fun, compassionate, caring and real my girls are. I am deeply proud of my family, my band of women that I have built around me. I propose to perpetuate the love of your friendship sisters, to push for a change of the flow of power inward, through and past the highway veins of an already constructed idea of how women should treat other women, and straight to the heart of what it means to be a woman:

To deal with immeasurable pain on so many different levels, in layers, throughout endless phases of our multifaceted, ever blossoming lives. All women know pain in some facet, that is our common ground, that is our link, our blood, our bond.

So next time you meet a woman and wish to judge her on her appearance, position, or sheer existence – think twice, and remember, she is your sister and fellow survivor of a world that we all struggle to not only thrive, but live in.