The problem with the 'Girl Math(s)' trend
The new trend of using spurious maths to justify unsustainable spending just doesn't add up
If you want to get a lifestyle craze trending on social media at the moment then you could do worse than stick the word ‘girl’ in its name.
Recent examples of the genre include ‘Hot Girl Walk’ - a trend promoting both the mental and physical health benefits of walking - and ‘Lazy Girl Job’ – a phenomenon extolling the virtues of improving your work life balance. There’s also ‘Girl Dinner’, which sent the internet into a frenzy over its simple prescription of low-effort snack-based dining, and now the newest addition to the crowd - ‘Girl Math’.
Many of the Girl trends have had their share of criticism, from accusations that Lazy Girl Job promotes low career aspirations to suggestions that Girl Dinner might encourage unhealthy dietary choices.
But, to me, Girl Math feels a bit more troubling than the previous trends. It originates from a New Zealand Radio show in which women ring in to describe recent high-cost purchases they’ve made. The hosts then use some basic maths to help the caller justify their spend.
For example, to justify the purchase of a $1000 designer bag, Girl Mathematicians might propose a five-year lifetime for the item and divide by that timespan to find a cost per day of just 55 cents. Suggestions of multiple uses for the bag (e.g. handbag, cabin bag, shopping bag, festival bag) might be proposed to suggest the purchase of the versatile item is actually saving you from having to spend more money on other items.
It’s a funny trope and its popularity is evidenced by the millions of views Girl Maths videos are getting on social media – particularly on TikTok. It’s also getting people to think about and do a little bit of real-world maths which (although not super high-level) from my viewpoint as a professional mathematician is always welcome. Indeed, calculating the daily cost of a purchase over it’s lifetime is not a terrible suggestion when it comes to budgeting, although it’s a calculation you should really do before making the big-ticket purchase rather than to justify it afterwards.
I have a couple of gripes with the trend, however. My first issue is with the name itself. Mathematicians have fought and indeed continue to fight a battle for representation in our traditionally male-dominated subject. We constantly struggle against tropes which suggest maths isn’t for girls or that “girls don’t like hard maths” – a theory advanced by the Government’s former social mobility tsar Katharine Birbalsingh.
So I find the idea that there is maths for girls (the Girl Math trope typically employing fairly straightforward calculations) and by implication maths for boys, hard to stomach. As I have argued previously it’s important the we continue to reinforce the idea that all of maths is for everyone.
Sometimes the logic underlying Girl Math TikToKs can leave a little to be desired. For example, under the unwritten rules of Girl Math, returning an item of clothing that costs $50 and then buying another item with a price tag of $100 means that that second item, in fact, only cost $50. Again, I know it’s a joke, but the justification of clearly flawed reasoning by its association with girls, as if this is a trait specific to women, doesn’t do anything to dispel long-held and damaging stereotypes. Similar to the ‘women are bad drivers’ trope (which is a pernicious myth), this sort of stereotype can seep into the view that the caricatured group hold of themselves. Dubious Math would be a far more accurate name for the trope, as well as removing its stigmatising impact, but of course it wouldn’t capitalise on the ‘Girl’ trend and perhaps would never have gone viral in the first place.
My other issue with the trend is that, for some people, Girl Math may become more than just a joke. Some of the more worrying tropes that Girl Math relies on are that ‘cash isn’t real money’ or that purchases under $5 are ‘pretty much free’. Indeed, in line with the ‘cash isn’t real money’ trope, there is evidence to suggest that people pay in cash for purchases they find harder to justify to themselves so that there is no electronic paper trail. This makes it easier for the guilt associated with the offending purchase to be forgotten and similar purchases repeated in the future. Reversing a seductive Girl Math calculation for the $5 trope, it’s also worth working out that a $5 purchase every day of the year adds up to $1825 over the course of a year – a significant portion of most people’s annual budget.
I’m all in favour of spending our hard earned salaries on the things we enjoy and which make our lives better - we need these perks to lighten our moods in these difficult economic times – but it’s important to remember there is a literal price tag attached to those purchases. I am advocating for spending our money with agency and intention – budgeting and planning in order to make the treats we afford ourselves viable in the long-term, avoiding the post hoc Girl Math justifications that could lead to unsustainable spending habits.
This piece is adapted from my independent article, which can be found here.
Why not call it 'Politician Maths' instead?