Sad Girl revolution

The pressure to appear happy is a strange one, I'd go as far as to say it's not a female-only issue. Toxic masculinity would have men be confident and curve their self-doubt, insecurities and fears as well. The big difference is that a woman can display no strong emotion and be accused of 'resting bitch face' or asked by a complete stranger to stop it. Where a man may only face censure for giving way to strong negative emotions. It's the control that men feel they should be allowed over women's feelings that is damaging.

There's a wave of online-feminism that totes happiness as an act of revolution- that being oppressed in some way and still finding happiness and self-worth is a refusal to be crushed. But, like, why? Why should I be cheerful when my rights are seen as optional? I'm being obtuse, I know that if I march and shout and scream in the street I can smile and be calm in my own space. And one could argue that remaining strong and happy is the very purpose of feminism, so I'll give you that one.

So happiness is good (obviously) but where does that leave actual women? As far as I'm concerned happy women are on instagram and real women have fun, but they're not happy. The laughs that I share with my female pals are more akin to the fantastic So Sad Today twitter account. There's lots of stating bald facts about our loneliness and frustration whilst simultaneously screaming with laughter. If I were to sit down for coffee with a woman who tells me about how happy she is I would expect her to a) try and sell me something, or b) be incredibly unobservant, seriously girl, the world is on fire.

When pulling apart this kind of humour the temptation is to call it solipsistic, self-indulgent and first-world-problem-y. But dismissing women's right to feel disconnected is just another way of dismissing women.

Three weeks ago I started a podcast with my bestie Cate Beattie, it would be a place for us to feel sad and not be guilty. This is a remarkably hard thing to achieve. Even when we have explicitly said this there's we still apologise or make comments like 'You can't say that out loud'. I didn't think it was a remarkably feminist thing to do, and then I googled "Depression podcast" and all the results were all male. Valid and funny, but male.

The closest examples of funny, female sadness in mainstream films I can think of deal superficially with women who have been heartbroken by men ( Bridget Jones, First Wives Club, Legally Blonde). Independent cinema works harder with Greta Girwig, Jenny Slate, Lake Bell, Kristen Wiig and others doing a bad job at being a grown up in the same way men in films like Fight Club, Knocked Up and anything Woody Allan ever touched are.

Musicians are taking up the call easily, with musicians like Taco Cat, The Prettiots, and Mistki writing songs with lyrics like "On a scale of one to Plath I'm like a four, My head's not in the oven, but I can't get off the floor". Skirting misery with humour in a way that's super female.It's not the male version of sadness that points to the world and says it's society that did this; it's a conversation. You're invited to laugh and feel less lonely. You could call it venting or you could label it as women providing validation.

While women are more likely to seek help for mental health issues, female sadness is often couched in shame, it's off-brand and unappealing so stop it. An excellent illustration of being women being asked to be happy when they're not is in the hugely under rated Inside Out. The biggest criticism to women who express their sadness or dissatisfaction is that they are unattractive. I don't watch Girls (because I hold women to an impossibly high standard and Lena Durham is problematic AF) but if I did watch I know I'd find messy, complex women who feel sad and are given airtime that would usually be dedicated to women tripping along in high heels, greeting sandwich sellers by their first name and meeting their third act with a go-get-em-attitude and excellent makeup.

There's more space for women to feel things without being shouted at,. In the meantime, Lily and Cate Aren't Doing Great comes out when it comes out on iTunes and Soundcloud.