What is a Woman?

In: Sydney Sweeney and the 'Bama Swampbae. Out: Sameera Khan and Whatever Andrea Long Chu Is.

Going Full Marilyn

I wanted to share some of my thoughts on the Feminine Question, which is somehow going unanswered.

The recent debate on X about the fresh-faced Alabama outdoorswoman vs the Instagram thotfaced fauxminity expert got me thinking.

What is a woman, really?

Or rather, what makes one?

I don’t mean biologically. That science has been settled for a while. Everyone knows what it takes to be female.

But what does it take to be feminine? And is femininity required to be considered fully female?

Looks like these questions might still need answering.

A Tale of Two Sydneys

I barely watched the Oscars—did you? It was notable for being forgettable this year, which is maybe a good thing. Hollywood’s hegemony wanes; new things rise, new things jostle through barely-there silk.

A pair of new things rising made their debut last week in the form of one Sydney Sweeney, America’s Newest Sweetheart.

Last week’s thrills upon beholding her impeccably heaving cleavage proved that an elusive, all-but-extinct creature had suddenly reappeared in nature.

The official Latin name for this species is Blondus Babeus Americanius.

Natural, girl-next-door-but-with-a-great-rack femininity was back.

I even did a whole podcast about it with my friend

Dudley Newright

, who also posted this bit of genius:

He managed to squeeze references from the last six month of femininity discourse into that little blurb.

But alas, all had not been settled in the femininity wars.

Swampbae Tomboy vs the Sephora Addict

This week’s online debate pitted a fresh-faced ‘Bama swampbae against an ultra-glam, ultra plastic-enhanced fauxminine, who went viral when she insisted that “feminine” women do not hunt, fish, wear jeans, use hammers, or work on anything but their faces. She went on to racially and ethnically hate on American women, calling them (us) “men.”

You can read the thread here. But then catfish-catchin’ belle Hannah Baron clapped back at Sameera Khan.

So did everyone else who loves American women:

This is Sameera and what I guess is her version of feminine perfection:

Maybe America is finally tired of this overtly unnatural look. The Zoom face. I hope so.

Hot Tomboy Summer

Calling Hannah Baron a “tomboy” is totally inaccurate, by the way. It demonstrates a total misunderstand of that word and American history.

The word “tomboy”refers to a young, prepubescent girl who likes to climb trees with other little boys, get dirty, and wears her brother’s clothes so she doesn’t get her Sunday dress messy and make Ma get out of the switch.

Of course, Sameera might not have known what a tomboy is because poor tomboys have actually gone extinct. Tomboys are extinct because their mothers change their names to Frank and sew Frankenweenies to their crotches.

Tomboys are not 25 year old busty brunettes who wear string bikinis in the river and have burly bohunk boyfriends.

The word I think Sameera meant was “butch,” but that’s also inaccurate. Butch is mostly used to describe hearty lesbians who reject feminine clothing and hairdos and do present themselves in traditionally male ways. These women used to stomp around Urban Outfitters in baggy jorts, wallet chains, and cropped gray buzz cuts. But they were still 100% women.

A trillion times more female than Andrea Long Chu (we’ll get to him), or that simpering twit Dylan Mulvaney.