what does it mean to be a girl’s girl?

What does it mean to be a girl’s girl? Love Island USA has wrapped up its seventh season. While this season was a disappointment in many regards due to a slew of cast members with racially insensitive social media histories, the season managed to get us to interrogate a phrase that has been embedded in Love Islands culture across seasons: “girl’s girl”. A girl’s girl is seemingly a woman who puts the needs of other women before her own. She’s quick to share a pad in the bathroom, or let you know when you have a hair out of place, or choose your friendship over a relationship with a man. It seems that claiming to be a girl’s girl means that you get a fast pass when it comes to forming friendship, your womanhood is enough to bring you into the fold of trust and of expectation. The expectation to be loyal and selfless. As showcased throughout season seven of LIUSA, the weight of this expectation falls heaviest on the shoulders of Black women.

To explore this, I will focus on the relationship between Cierra and Olandria on LIUSA season 7.  To the despair of some, race does play a role in everything. While both the women are women of color--Cierra is Mexican and Puerto Rican and Olandria is Black American, nonblack women of color can exhibit antiblackness and microaggressions towards Black women, as seen in their relationship.

To begin, before Cierra was kicked off the show for using a racial slur against Asian people online, Cierra and Olandria were viewed as the most emotionally intelligent women on the show. Cierra was applauded for her communication skills with her romantic connections. I remember a moment where she told Huda “let’s be classy” after Huda bugged out on Jeremiah. Indicating that Cierra viewed that there was a certain way to go about conflict. It’s for this very reason, the way that she carried herself, that I believe Cierra’s bias (even if unintentional) against Olandria went under the radar to some. Those who are familiar with the season know the details of the fallout between Cierra, Olandria, and their partners Nic and Taylor, but for those unfamiliar I will sum up the major details. On Night 1, Olandria kissed Nic, but ended up coupling with Taylor. Nic ended up pairing up with another islander Bell-a. The following night during a challenge where every islander is blindfolded so that they may secretly kiss the other islanders they are interested in, Nic removes his blindfold and kisses a blindfolded Olandria. In this same challenge, Cierra enters as a bombshell. In a recoupling, Nic chooses to recouple with Cierra, sending Bell-a home. This begins his connection with Cierra. As stated before, Olandria is coupled up with Taylor, but it is clear that he is not interested in her. From the jump it is clear that Nic and Olandria have interest in one another, and it is even later revealed that Olandria did not pursue Nic originally because of his love triangle with Cierra and Bell-a. However, after Casa Amor, Nic and Olandria are given the opportunity to couple up with one another and they kiss outside of a challenge creating a kiss that “was heard around the world”, but both insist that there was no spark out of respect for their respective partners, Cierra and Taylor. 

Upon being told about it, Cierra insists that the kiss didn’t bother her and that she was glad it was Olandria if it had to be someone. This instance is…sketchy…at best, because it implies that she does not see Olandria, a stunning dark skin Black woman, as a threat. Love Island is a (mostly) heterosexual competition dating show so everyone of the same sex who kisses your man outside a challenge should be considered a threat because in the words of bombshell Andreina, they might just take your man! Speaking of Andreina, when she arrived as a bombshell and fulfilled Jeremiah’s dreams of a foreign latina and also caused Nic’s head turn, Cierra was understandably uncomfortable with his interest in her and some might even say threatened. When Cierra was away from Nic during Casa, she was crying herself to sleep over the possibility that Nic could be somewhere making a connection with other girls. But when told about his kiss outside of a challenge with Olandria, she didn’t care? And you might say, well that’s her friend so maybe she rather her friend than a stranger. Girl, look me in my eyes. In what world would you rather your friend kiss your man than a stranger? And I push that further by asking, were they really friends? 

I chose to highlight Cierra and Olandria’s relationship as a critique of the “girl’s girl” phenomena because I think that too often loyalty and servitude is expected from Black women simply because we are Black women. As a Black woman, other nonblack women can exhibit a kind of overfamiliarity and unearned trust with me in a way that feels descended from the mammy trope. The quickness to suddenly use a blaccent when speaking to me, to overshare, and as I’ve seen done to others, not view Black women as a threat romantically because they do not expect anyone to be interested in us over them are all aspects of the mammy stereotype. This stereotype still shows up in the media with the Black best friend whose only duty is to serve as confidant to the protagonist. It has nestled its way into reality tv dating shows where the Black women become the therapists of the cast and are friendzoned as us at home hope for someone to come in and show interest in them. Olandria has been called the soul of the villa, rightfully so, and is the person everyone came to for support. So of course to Cierra, she would not be a threat. It’s Olandria. She’s just a friend. 

After Cierra gets kicked off, Olandria and Nic make a real attempt at their romantic relationship, to much success. In the wake of their friendship turned romance, Olandria has received a lot of hate for not being a “girl’s girl”. By the second episode of the season, Huda had already told us in fifteen different ways that she is a girls’ girl, and correspondingly as the season progressed, all of her actions went on to show how she is completely male centered. If anyone ever calls me a girl’s girl, I will take it as an insult because clearly you are calling me stupid. Every girl that has ever proclaimed to be a girl’s girl has been the most male-centered, shady, weird, girl I have ever seen in my life (yes I am talking about Huda). Do you ever notice how the term girl’s girl is only employed when men are involved? The label certifies that you will have a woman’s back over that of a man, which isn’t in and of itself a bad thing, but the term, like white feminism as a whole, is so male centered. White feminism is all about being able to do what white men can do (see Hillary Clinton, Taylor Swift, Susan B. Anthony, Taylor Swift again). And to be clear, white women are not the only women who practice/weaponize white feminism. White feminism believes that women become liberated the second they are able to navigate the world as destructively as men do. Comparatively, Black feminism, or even intersectional feminism, operates with the understanding that we are all suffering--men included. They are suffering from the expectations of patriarchy that prevent them from being human beings who can feel emotions, be vulnerable, and cry. Which Chelley notes twice throughout the season when she encourages the men to cry. One time being when Bryan said he was “crying like a girl” after receiving a heartfelt message from his mom, and Chelley, a Black woman islander, responds, “No, you were crying like a man”. Intersectional feminism, as practiced by Black feminists and some feminists of color, understands that when we destroy the culture of domination created by patriarchy, we can all be liberated. We don’t want the “freedom” that white men have, we want a completely different kind of freedom. Bringing this back to Love Island, being a girls’ girl is yet another structure of white feminism that hinders Black women because the failure to be a “girls’ girl” falls hardest on Black women. When Olandria decides to put her desires first for likely the first time in her life on Love Island, she fails to be a “girls girl” to a woman she’s only known for five weeks. The whole point of Love Island is to compete for love. As has been said time and time again, “this is not friendship Island”, and yet that went completely out the window this season. Likely because it was a Black woman who had the courage to put a potential connection to the test at the risk of upsetting a friend and the entire country! 

Yes, Cierra cried to Olandria because she was anxious about her connection with Nic and if my friend listened to me cry over a man only to later kiss him I’d be pissed! But it’s as though people have suddenly forgotten the conditions of the villa and the dating-competition-game that the contestants signed up for. Nic and Olandria had interest in one another from the beginning, this interest did not suddenly appear because Cierra was interested in Nic (Huda can’t relate). This was a messy situation that Olandria carried with grace and care. So much so that she was willing to put her desire to the side for Nic and Cierra to be together, and she only pursued it after Cierra left. But the gag is, even if she went for it right after Casa she would not be in the wrong and she would not be the first islander in history to express interest in a “friend’s” connection. While Olandria is lauded for her loyalty, Black woman’s loyalty is not owed to you. Loyalty is built from trust, familiarity, and being viewed as an equal. The relationships between Black women and non-Black women sometimes fail to establish ground in any of those areas, and yet still come with the expectation of loyalty and being a “girl’s girl”. 

To close, this season’s cast and viewership was plagued with anti-black racists who dog piled on Black women at every opportunity they got. The relationships between the Black women and non-black women on the show was often the breeding zone for this anti-black racism (Chelley and Huda is a whole other conversation). These macro-aggressions were cleverly disguised behind the fight for women to be “girl’s girls”. We are grown (for me growing) ass women, not little girls, so no, I am not a girl’s girl. I’m a real ass bitch! Nah, I’m playing. But seriously, actions speak louder than words. I am a woman who likes building genuine relationships and treating people with respect. Both of which imply that the way I move will be respectful of all others who show me respect. No need to slap a corny ass, fake ass, label to prove that. Isn’t it a bit reductive for women to have to proclaim that they treat other women with respect?