This year, only 60 percent of the Oscar Best Picture nominees properly represented women. It’s true: we talk to each other about more than just men.

Created by cartoonist Alison Bechdel in 1985, the initial comic strip which we now know as the infamous Bechdel Test was intended as a comedic, satirical look at the characterization of women in movies and books. If two women who are named in the script speak to each other about something other than a man, then the work passes. It’s surprising how many of our favorite movies and books actually fail.

The funny thing is that oftentimes I find myself actually living in a failed Bechdel Test.

The few years I spent learning computer programming and engineering left me feeling isolated due to the blatant misogyny and lack of relatability I had. Even in literature, I’ve often felt more properly represented in a book’s descriptions of a woman’s appearance than in any of the words she ever says.

Many proponents of the test’s usage believe that the Bechdel Test can help us observe statistical long-term trends in female representation in literature and movies (or lack thereof ).

However, many critics assert that the test is heavily biased against certain genres, storytelling styles, unreliable narrators, and stories centered around nature.

In practice, the Bechdel Test actually overlooks more than the genre or story itself.

Heavy imposition of the test can disintegrate the impact a work has on its female audience when faced with a test’s result which carries an antithetical stipulation that something which resonates with them truly does not represent them in any way. The blind, serious usage of the Bechdel Test often discounts the nuance that leads to a work’s passage or failure.

In my eyes, the Bechdel Test is more representative of our human tendency to bring boiling, uncomfortable topics like feminism, representation, and oppression to a digestible, black-and-white simmer. Timidity toward the intimidating nature of the issues at hand is precisely what reinforces the same, widespread isolation every girl knows all too well.

It should go without saying that I am not a dialogue tag; I am a woman. But more than being a woman, I am a human being.

These are factual statements that have been aimlessly offroading since the installation and enforcement of a patriarchal system in our society. But what if the Bechdel Test’s oversimplification of female representation in art actually serves as an ironic demonstration of a patriarchal society’s attempt to further divide women and undermine the egalitarian nature of feminism?

The representation of a marginalized group cannot legitimately be satisfied by mere checkboxes.

Our idea of representation is something that is constantly changing with time and increasing societal openness. We must be the change we would like to see in the world, and be receptive to the stories of marginalized creators. A woman’s world will not change if that world stands for division.

Through unity, education, and distinction, we can standardize a world where a girl’s everyday life passes the Bechdel Test, and where she feels represented regardless of how many women are conversing about the weather in her favorite movie.

And in case you were wondering, don’t worry: this article passed.

Editor’s note: This article was written by Grossmont High School student Mia Azuela.

Top photo credit: Pixabay.com