Get Outta Here With Your Girl Math

A “Cutesy, Funny” Trend With Troubling Implications

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Driving home from my errands today, I heard something on the radio that made my head almost explode. I wasn’t in a good mood as it was given the price of groceries, but what I heard took the damn cake! And I can’t even afford the damn cake, because I can do math. I promise, my assertion that I am skilled in mathematics will become relevant soon.

I was listening to a local talk radio show and the host was discussing a new or newish trend on TikTok, something called Girl Math. I don’t follow trends anymore (the last trend I followed were Doc Martins and hypercolour t-shirts, so, you get the idea) so this was new to me.

He explained that it was this cute funny thing wherein young ladies get on TikTok and make little videos which highlight their lack of financial savvy. Maybe it’s hyperbole, maybe not. Effectively, they’re rationalizing poor decision-making and calling it Girl Math.

We’ve all made poor financial choices and then rationalized them. You don’t through this life without doing that. But it’s not girl math or boy math or any math. It’s simply rationalizing poor decision-making.

I had to check this out when I got home and sure enough all over YouTube and TikTok there are young women, mostly very attractive, rationalizing poor choices and explaining how it’s “Girl Math.” They say things like:

If you pay for concert tickets, like 3 months in advance, then when you get there, it’s free.

If you pay cash for something, it’s free because it didn’t come out of your bank account.

If you go to Starbucks and use your app, it was free.

Common sense dictates that none of these statements are true. The concert isn’t free, it’s paid for, the money came out of Miss Girl Math’s account 90 days before the date. Paying cash doesn’t equal free, operative word “paying.” And the app…come on.

The sheer stupidity grinds me. I’m not the type to suffer fools gladly, even in jest (if this is indeed jest).

But it’s worse than that. I see larger, more nefarious implications. As a woman, I’ve long lamented the societal smart vs attractive dichotomy as regards women and girls. The hot girl is never smart and the smart girl is never hot. In movies, on television, beauty and brains live on opposite ends of the street and rarely, if ever meet.

It’s a false narrative one one well past its prime. Intelligence and conventional beauty can exist in the same woman.

That’s me in the picture and I do this only to make the point. I’m 32, 21, 36 and I’m fairly bright. I graduated near the top of my class in high school. I left my undergrad with a degree never before granted and a 4.2 GPA while working full-time and raising 3 boys. I walked out of law school with First Class Honours.

I’m no dummy. And I’m not exactly hideous. I’m also not unique. There are millions, maybe billions of pretty, intelligent women out there, some prettier and smarter than me. This girl math bullshit does nothing but perpetuate the damaging and false narrative that we don’t.

It also reinforces the old boy vs girl vs math stereotype that streamed generations of talented young women away from careers in STEM. What message is this sending to young girls right now? That it’s not cool to be able to do basic mathematics or to think logically? It’s 2024, how have we not moved past this already?

We can’t be trusted with money. It’s too complicated for us. There’s always a man in these videos, a dad, a boyfriend or a husband. He’s always dumbfounded and tries to argue with the girl doing her “math.” Well, fu*k, best take away our bank accounts and credit cards. Maybe we all better be put on allowances, eh? I mean, we can’t be trusted to be responsible, we’re just girls. Math is just so hard. Are you serious?

You can accuse me of being a crusty Gen Xer with no sense of humour but I don’t find trends that perpetuate damaging and false stereotypes about women cute or funny. I don’t think these are messages we want to be sending our young girls.

Stupidity is NOT cute. It’s not feminine. I am not impressed. Of course, what do I know, I’m just a girl who can do math with a really hot body. ;)

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