I used to be a guys girl, and I was quite proud of it. I didn't feel comfortable around women. With men I felt more relaxed and less guarded. When I was with women I felt judged and mis understood. Much of this was because deep down, I really just hated myself. I constantly compared myself to other women. Comparing beauty, weight, relationship status, or popularity. Much of this was not due to any fault of other women, it simply lied with me.

I… WE are NOT black sheep. WE are radiant glow-in-the-dark sheep. Not white, not red, blue, yellow, or any other ordinary primary colour. WE are the sheep that lead the way, the beacons of light that fought, survived and shattered cycles.

Rarely can one conjure up a realistic image of a Black Cowgurl unless it’s from a movie such as Gang of Roses [2003] starring; Monica Calhoun, Lil’ Kim and Stacy Dash. There’s also They Die by Dawn [2013] with Erika Badu based on real life characters in Langston Oklahoma an All Black Town.

As a human being, I struggle with the way my body looks. I can confidently say that every single human being (males and females) struggles with this concept. It is literally engrained in our minds at a young age that we all need to be thinner, toner, and tanner in order to be better. That is just society, social media, and celebrities in today’s society, and I feel as though it's just getting worse and worse with Instagram models blowing up your news feed.

What we watch can almost influence us to be better or act like the characters we see. This is probably the reason parents don’t like when their kids watch Spongebob and rather they watch shows with more dynamic characters. Characters are on of the biggest part of the storytelling—actually scratch that, they’re the biggest. Some characters we don’t like and want to punch them through the TV; others we love the point we’re on the verge of tears. Today I would like to touch on female characters, but not just any females—the badass female characters who have the attitude we wish we had when we’re lying on the couch with popcorn. Now what makes a female character badass? To me, a female character is bad ass when she stirs away from the normal and has new thoughts and does risky things that we may not like. She isn’t a perfect character and reflects a real person and not just a fantasy. Badass doesn’t mean they don’t cry or show emotions, it instead means they make choices for themselves and later on can accept responsibility for those choices. Here are some tv female characters from shows I love that I find badass.

It's a given that when the topic of anything "nerdy" comes up, the standard image that most people think of is that weird guy in the basement drinking unholy amounts of Mountain Dew and watching Star Trek. Right? While that stereotype might have some basis in reality, the nerd culture of today has evolved into something much different, and it includes a variety of fans from all walks of life which, yes, includes women.

Booksmart follows Molly and Amy, two overachieving high-school seniors who are about to graduate. They realise on the night before their graduation that they have been focusing so hard on studying and getting good grades that they have missed out on all the fun of high school, so they decide to let loose and attend the craziest party of the year.

The ordeal started in grade school. Post summertime, new school year and I was already feeling the "first-day" jitters creep up on me. That's typical every school year. Growing up in a ghetto neighborhood had always been a struggle for women like me. If you acted different (non-black), you were basically treated... like a lame and a nobody.

So I know the reference "Sister Sadie" from the Nina Simone song "Mississippi Goddam." It has the line "Yes, you lied to me all these years you told me to wash and clean my ears, and talk real fine just like a lady and you’d stop calling me Sister Sadie."

There are some communities that need to have groups fighting for their rights, like LGBTQ, women, people of color, etc. Then there are those groups like the Men's Rights Activists groups that have sprung up in recent years. Cisgendered, white men feel that they are under attack because there are more diverse movies and TV shows on the air now, and this is not ok with them. Can you imagine a female being anything but helpless and in need of a big, strong man to save her? It flies in the face of their reality, and they are not afraid to let people know that.