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Home / New Zealand

It's eat or be eaten in this girl's world

By Emily Clarke
NZ Herald·
5 Sep, 2011 11:20 PM3 mins to read

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AN all-girls' school is rough. Guys think they have it hard having to put up with our incessant nagging and bitching, but imagine what it's like to be right in the middle of it.

As harmless as some females may seem, they have the same tactics as a Japanese
fighting cat - they appear innocent and cute until someone really annoys them, then the annoyer should run for the hills.

But girls aren't loud about their problems. We express our anger in the meanest of ways; behind others' backs, through small glances, tones of voice and unnecessary comments on their behalf.

Though we should ignore this behaviour, girls love to analyse it to the point where it consumes our entire being to know why someone didn't smile at us.

What makes us act this way? When it comes to boys, it's one punch and all is forgiven. Girls can drag a problem out for weeks, months, even years.

These little things make girls feel unwelcome, unhappy, looked down on, self-conscious and like a total loser.

I always thought the general instinct for all creatures was to protect their own. Not in girl world. It's either eat or be eaten.


Some get a big kick out of bringing others down. What I don't get is how they aren't banished to boy land for such disgraceful behaviour.

Yet girls seem to respect those who are the meanest to others. Is it out of fear? Or do we really think the meaner someone is, the cooler they are?

What these girls don't realise is the physical damage that put-downs can cause. I have seen with my own eyes what girls under pressure can do to help themselves.

Parents will say it's a phase some girls go through, or they think we are over-reacting.

Bullying is seen as mostly physical attacks but people don't realise it is the mental side of bullying that is the true killer. The mind games some girls find fun can be far more damaging than any black eye. They can rot a person from their core till there is nothing left but emptiness.

Every girl I know has had some sort of problem with their female peers, so why does it happen?

In my experience, it's women in general. We are incredibly sensitive to small gestures from our peers.

This can makes a harmless glance in our general direction seem like a death threat.

On one hand this is girls being overly paranoid and judgmental, as we always are. On the other hand, girls tend to show their true feelings through small physical hints or undertones.

Because we do this ourselves, we wrongly think every other girl does too.

Girls act the way they do because of their female minds. We react to our feminine instincts and go with what we feel a lot of the time, disregarding feelings for others.

We analyse and dissect every little thing people do until it is twisted into something far from reality.

The female mind is powerful. Whether they put those powers to the greater good is up to them. God help you all.

Emily Clarke, Year 12, St Cuthbert's College

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