Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Girls against girls

There are so many fundamental differences between men and women. These differences do not necessarily make one sex unequal to the other except for when it comes to friendship. At the risk of sounding sexist, I have to admit that I think boys are better at friendship than us girls. It’s not just the obvious bro's before ho's bullshit (which isn’t exactly bullshit since I am hard pressed to find a girl to hang out with unless her boyfriend has already made other plans) but it’s the way they treat one other. Girls are always comparing themselves to their friends and even worse, competing with them. If you think you have a girlfriend who doesn’t do this trust me she does or at least has, albeit secretly. On some level it makes sense. Evolutionarily, cross-culturally and historically speaking, we are accustomed to competing for mates. While males do this using physical aggression, females opt for social aggression. Think about it! Females tarnish each others images all of the time, commenting on others physically unattractive qualities, promiscuous habits and several other abhorrent traits. Whether or not we can help it, there is a real comradery that seems to be missing from female friendships.

Here’s a comparison of some infamous male and female friendships. Yes I know they’re fictitious, but it’s both fun and interesting to see how Hollywood depicts male and female friendships differently.

Bunk and McNulty from The Wire


These two always have each others backs. No matter what, McNulty always takes care of Bunk when he gets too wasted and Bunk always protects McNulty when he’s in trouble with their boss. They make a real effort to secure each others happiness.

Kelly and Brenda from 90210


These two idiots are supposedly best friends but Kelly has a fling with Brenda’s boyfriend while she’s away on vacation. What a bitch!

Turk and J.D from Scrubs


My dream friendship! It's easy to see why these two are so addicted to each other, they have so much fun together. They have a codependent relationship and actually go through pretty severe bouts of depression when they can’t see one another. Some might find this unhealthy but I think it’s so cute!

Hedy and Allie from Single White Female


Hedy (or should I say, ELLEN) becomes obsessed with Allie and freaks out when Allie wants to move in with her boyfriend. Her idea of revenge is to kill Allie’s puppy, copy her hair style and give her a boyfriend a blow job before murdering him with her high heel! See, girls are evil.

House and Wilson from House


In the interest of fairness, here is an example of a not so perfect male friendship. House is a pretty shitty friend to Wilson but compared to how shitty he treats everyone else, Wilson should be grateful!

Thelma and Louis from Thelma and Louise


This is the only female friendship that I can think of that rivals these aforementioned male bonds. After all nothing says comradery like joint suicide! Still, Louise had to put up with so much annoying shit because of stupid Thelma…J.D and Turk would never ditch each other for some hot hitchhiker.

Despite all of this, I will say that women understand other women in ways that no man could and as a result, girlfriends are a necessarily evil. As much as I envy friendships like J.D and Turk's, I’m still pretty fucking happy to be a woman.

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