“Why can’t I just feel comfortable enough to tell you that you are cute?”

“There is always a competition with females.”

“I feel like females do other things just to impress other females.”

While having one of the many daily talks that I have with my roommate, we started talking about females. These three statements stood out the most to me. I agree with her. We both felt as if women aren’t as unified as they should be. It’s a reality for us all, that a lot of us feel that we are in competition with one another. I feel like society and social media is the cause of that. Girls get dolled up to get attention, which is perfectly fine. But at some point they begin to care about having the most likes and retweets. When it becomes a competition, then girls tend to down other girls. There is a need to “nitpick” and disassemble someone else’s appearance.

In society, it is always shown that women are always in battle or being shady toward one another. You don’t see that a lot with men. It is shown through reality television shows. I can bet you that there is not one Love & Hip Hop or Bad Girls Club episode where females aren’t down each other's’ throats or hating. There is so much cattiness and fighting. There is not enough unity and support among women. It is seen on social media everywhere. Girls are competing about who looks the best, who is the prettiest, and it should not be that way. Instead, it should be women empowering one another and not being afraid to complement one another.

I want to pose a question as to why females aren’t so accepting or open to congregating with new females that they encounter? It seems harder to make friends for females but for dudes it’s so easy. Men can find things in common to talk about and they get along, but women can’t and they actually have a lot of things in common with one another. I think the problem isn’t with finding a topic to talk about, it’s with the initiation of the conversation.

My entire life, I have been around males. Since I am the only girl out of six, it should not come as a shock. I grew up around my brothers, their friends, my father, and my uncles. Yes, I have had female friends and obviously female family members but it was never just so easy for me to make friends with another girl. Especially girls who had an ego or acted like a diva. Those girls, the popular, cliquish type were the hardest to get along with. I’m the social type but it’s something about girls like that causes to become uncomfortable with trying to start a conversation with them.

Me as a person, I’ve always been someone who got along with everyone. I was never the popular kid, but more so the inbetween the popular and the unpopular. But I always had a tiny problem with becoming friends with the “popular” girls. They just seemed unapproachable. It was just like the movie "Meangirls."Regina George, the most popular girl at the school, was a total jerk to everyone. Focusing on how she would treat the other girls who weren’t as attractive or popular as her, shows how intimidating it can be to compliment other girls. I mean she had a table in the cafeteria sectioned off for her and her clique and no one else. The famous line “You can’t sit with us,” is why girls across America are scared to speak to someone they admire.

We’ve got to stop the competing for a spot that has room for everyone. We’ve got to live and appreciate one another. We’ve got to become united and empower one another. Although, there is a lot of support already, we need more. We have to stop judging and fighting. Women making the step to support other women, is a step closer to making the world a better place.