When did our gender roles narrow so much that ordinary clothes define our personhood?
I'm wearing jodphurs, boots and a hoody today. I wear jeans and boots most days; it's been months since I wore a skirt. I often have my hair tied up in a bun. Yet, in the words of Sojourner Truth, am I not a woman too?
When I was young my mum told me I walked like a farmer because I liked to stride about, there was nothing delicate about my steps. Now I have some acreage to stride about in, I'm grateful for my length of stride. But even in muddy gumboots, I'm still a woman.
I am sorry for the pressure young girls face to fit in to some conventional idea of femininity. And I'd be so angry with her friends, except that they're only playing out the nonsense they see on social media.
You are doing a good job, teaching her that being a woman is not about appearance.
There's a really good thread on here within the last couple of weeks called, I think, "Brilliant woman", which had lots of examples of women going their own way and doing their own thing, in the face of conventions. Maybe your daughter might find their stories encouraging.
Women have pretty much always worked and had to wear practical clothes to work in. The rise of the über feminine ideal is, I think, and expression of cultural anxiety, and as such, neither real nor stable (I hope).
Your daughter sounds like an excellent and sensible young person. Long may she stomp in her RMs.