When I was a kid, I identified as a tomboy for quite a while. My sister and I took after our older brother and father who watched action movies and TV shows so growing up my favorite things to watch were Avatar: The Last Airbender, TMNT, Teen Titans, the Fast & Furious movies, Lego Ninjago, Spiderman, Avengers, Batman, etc. I used to say my favorite color was black because I didn’t want to say it was pink, which I decided was 3rd after red. As I got older, I stopped denying that I loved pink and embraced it instead, but it took a while to embrace my feminine qualities because it felt like I was betraying some part of myself. It’s a strange feeling to define but assimilating to society’s version of what a girl should be made me physically ill. Not to mention the stereotypes of a Black girl, which I don’t exactly line up with either.
Liz Prince’s graphic memoir Tomboy has a panel showing a chalkboard that reads “Tomboy = a girl of boyish behavior” but if you only associate being stubborn or independent and strong with being male then that insinuates that those qualities can’t solely belong to a female, and that’s wrong. Prince explains she felt as though the word (although defined generally) fully describes her lifestyle and that she was born that way, but there are several ways that a child adopts a certain behavior, and the only thing you’re born doing is crying.
I always think it’s interesting to see how femininity is displayed in the women around me, even my friends who dislike wearing dresses now that we’re older, but still wear feminine clothing. I mostly wear dresses to church or special occasions, but I also wear clothing that could be considered tomboyish, which to me always seemed like a phase I went through before realizing that what I wear and what I like didn’t change the fact that I’m a woman. God intentionally created me to be a woman and so the more I talked with Him about it and read about it, I wanted to embrace it in my own way. The extent of my makeup-wearing is lip gloss and eyeshadow, I enjoy wearing heels that are low and comfortable, yet I still own many many pieces of baggy clothing. I prefer wearing a book-bag over a purse despite my mom’s occasional persuasion which I find hilarious, I don’t get my nails done every month, and I still enjoy plenty of “boyish” media. I am my own version of feminine, and in my opinion I’d rather us women define femininity our own way rather than tagging “boy” onto something that is meant to describe us.
We are our own category, and we are diverse!! So, if a girl wants to bulk up, cover herself in tattoos and she loves purple motorcycles and wearing dresses, I say you do you, Queen! I’m sure plenty of women will still define themselves as tomboys and that is more than okay, I just hope they don’t think they can’t have certain qualities or achieve their goals because of their gender, and that it doesn’t diminish the great honor it is to be a woman <3
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