To think that there should be a female equivalent to "guys" or "chaps"

[TheBossofMe]

Leading on from another thread about terms used to describe women, I realised that there isn't a word that we use to describe a group of women that is gender-specific but not age-specific.

We use the terms "guys" or "chaps" for men and boys of any age. So someone can be one of the guys if he's 5, 15 or 50.

But for women, we have "girls" which should only be applied to the young and "women" which is only applied to the not-that-young-anymore.

So we need a whole new word, a MN-originated word, that we use to describe a group of females of any age.

Because we know that if we use it enough on MN, it eventually transcends into real life, and then into popular usage, and then the OED, and then immortality beckons for us all (or something!).

Anyone got any good ideas?

What's wrong with Dames and Gals? Or Chicas?

Y'all works, but it's gender neutral. All y'all is my fav.

Dames! A good historical word. I likes it :-)

DameRubyGates.... has a ring to it, certainly.

Dam is mother. Horses, sheep - even chickens (well, in a Macbeth-y sense). So it wouldn't work for women in general. It must be the origin of Dame though, surely?

Y'all has no singular. 'She's a great y'all' just don't work, sadly.

Dam is nicely Shakespeaian, but does have motherly/older woman connotations.

But anyone can be dubbed "Dame". although it does suggest having given long service for something so unlikely to be found on the very youthful.

I hate Y'all. And Chicas (surely just girls in Spanish?). Gals? Just Girls with a stagey New York accent, doesn't work for me either.