Girl world gripes

MANILA, Philippines - I’d hate to do the great Chuck Palahniuk disservice but it really must be said: Girl World is a lot like Fight Club. The rules are ridiculous. The fighting is dirty. And most of all, when you do fight, no one is going to help you. They’re just gonna watch along, cheer, and thank their luck that it isn’t them clinging to survive.

Okay, that doesn’t sound very fair, does it? I make girls sound like savages. We’re not savages. We’re girls. That’s a helluva lot worse.

The truth is that being a girl can really suck sometimes, but no one ever says that out loud because they don’t want to sound ungrateful. While we claim to be the fairer sex, we’ve also been arranging our social system in the same exact way since the dawn of time. The only difference is that back in 1000 BC, you didn’t have BlackBerry to backstab your girl friend who is acting like such a biatch.

If you’re in need of any proof, just ask pop culture. Every decade produces its own body of work that acts as a zeitgeist for female relationships. One can go back as far as Bette Davis in All About Eve or even The Powerpuff Girls. What is Sex and the City but a six-season, two-movie ode to how wrinkles will never set girls apart? (There is always Botox, after all.)

Females will always have a tendency to form groups, to want to become part of a group, or to lead a group. It’s as if women are physiologically incapable of being alone that even if it makes them miserable to join a bevy of women who make the Taliban seem like sweethearts, they’ll do it anyway.

I guess it is this undeniable truth also baffles me about my own gender. Why can’t we go to the bathroom by ourselves? Why can’t we leave ourselves alone and just be, you know, alone?

Personally, I’ve never felt a strong sense of need to be friends with girls just so I wouldn’t look like a loser. I never felt that in high school, and I certainly don’t feel that now. Maybe it’s because I’ve never been a girl’s girl. Maybe it’s because I’ll still look like a loser, anyway. Or plot twist: maybe it’s because I’m actually a lesbian. (Relax, Mom and Dad. That was a joke.)

Old Hollywood’s grand dame Bette Davis serves up tough girl realness when she finds out her so-called friend is trying to steal her life in All About Eve.

But before you get on your high horse, I’d just like to say that this lack of desire to become part of a girl clique does not entitle me to hold myself above other women. Different strokes for different folks. But believe me; I did try, if only to prove that I am no genetic anomaly.

I simply can’t do it.

Just a few weeks ago, I became better acquainted with the dynamics of girl cliques in the workplace. Like in any clique, working girls will be extremely nice to you upon introduction. They will do everything they can to make you feel like you belong, that you have a place in their little circle.

And then you will realize after that, you will need to work for their attention. They will barely laugh at your jokes but will expect you to nod and agree when they talk about their harsh bosses. They’ll still be nice to you, but when they invite you out to lunch, they will always manage to make it sound like an afterthought.

You will realize that this kind of friendship is the kind that you have to work for. You are then left with a decision to make. You can either suck it up and stay with them or call them out for being bitches. But then, how could you say that when they’ve never been anything but nice?

This is what I’ve been trying to tell you. Aren’t girls the meanest?

It took me maybe three work lunches to realize that I really couldn’t do it. Cliques are just not my thing. I have friends and I have girlfriends, but sometimes, I just can’t scratch up enough sympathy to care about why you can’t eat carbs or how today is your ex-anniversary and can’t be left alone. Am I really expected to deal with all of that when the amount of drama in my own life can probably light up Tokyo for a week? (I know. I’m such a diva.)

I hate sounding so bitter and whiny, and even worse is that I’ll probably never be able to verbalize these things out loud. Sure, I could get a backbone, but it only proves how deeply entrenched I am in this “sisterhood.” Regardless of whether I am or am not part of a clique, I can’t seem to find the courage to stab them in the front.

It all sounds completely ridiculous, and girls all over the world know it. It’s a little sad and terribly anti-feminist, but we continue to do it because it’s the only thing we know. Girls would rather continue to secretly hate life and be miserable than enjoy it in solitude. And if you ask them, they’ll never admit it. They’ll probably even tell you otherwise.

Like I said, Girl World is a lot like Fight Club. You fight dirty, and you fight in secret.

Maybe that’s why it stings more.