I wake up to 47 WhatsApp notifications on my phone. Three of my closest girlfriends have been busy overnight, chatting through life problems from different time zones. The first thing I do with my day is fondly roll my eyes and catch up: one of the girls needs advice on how to deal with a promotion she’s been offered without a definite pay rise or title change. The others have leapt in with practical suggestions, a timely reminder that she needs to know her own worth at work and a string of dancing lady emojis. Sleepily, I key in my best advice and send them a photo of my dog, Bert, for a little extra support.

Little exchanges of love, pragmatism and strength like this are happening all over the world – via WhatsApp, over a glass of rosé, in office bathrooms, at brunch, in book clubs, on walks, on the phone, at Pilates, nursing a cup of tea. Women are negotiating the experience of being female with one another, one enthusiastic hug, text message, piece of advice, heart-eyes emoji, reality check or whispered confession at a time.

We are working out how to get the jobs we want, whether to become mothers, how to look after our children and our parents, what to text a date who ghosts us, how to get Steve in accounting to stop calling us “pet”, what constitutes emotional abuse, if we should freeze our eggs, how to tell someone we’re not romantically interested in them, when to report harassment, what to say in that important work email, how to survive a break-up and what to wear to that all-important date/TV appearance/job interview/party. These chats can be joyous and helpful and life-saving – and they’re where some of our best political action is happening.

“We must abandon the cultural myth that all female friendships must be bitchy, toxic, or competitive. This myth is like heels and purses — pretty but designed to SLOW women down.”

Female friendship is the most powerful tool we have for the activation of feminism. Gloria Steinem and Dorothy Pittman Hughes knew that when they fought for feminism as friends, and so should we. It is our greatest defence against misogyny. It is our most profound hope as we fight, in fear and anger, the sexism that pervades our modern society. What, really, is the #MeToo movement if not a vital expression of female solidarity? Didn’t we feel united in distress and awe, watching Dr Christine Blasey Ford’s testimony against Brett Kavanaugh? Remember when millions of us marched in streets around the world to send a message to Donald Trump that women matter and they always have? All of these things are motivated by a sense of loyalty, unity and camaraderie between women. We, as a gender, have a biological and sociological head start when it comes to empathy and emotional honesty. Add a bit of hard-earned rage and we’ve got one of the most hopeful, alarming, wonderful, distressing, powerful feminist movements of our time.

Illustrations: Patti Andrews

Feminism is at its mightiest when it takes the form of female friendship. In a world that tries to control, tame and belittle women, it can be a revolutionary act to stand together, to talk and to listen. All the chats we have, all our gossip networks, all our girly hangout sessions – this is where women are doing some of their best work towards equality. We are looking after one another, we are allies, we are in this fraught female existence together. Every time your friend tells you to text her when you get home safely, she’s acknowledging how frightening it can be travel in public while female. Every time you tell a friend she deserves to be celebrated or promoted or recognised at work, you’re boosting our collective self-esteem. Every time you listen to a woman speak about trauma, fear and abuse, you validate her experience and the experiences of countless other women like her. Every time we chat about men who touch us or speak to us inappropriately, every time we wonder what to do as mothers or sisters or daughters or wives, every time we speak out loud the anxieties we have about our bodies, every time we sling an arm around each other’s waist for comfort, we’re reminding each other and ourselves that our girlfriends can be the greatest support known to woman.

“Women are taught to be communicators. Far from being a frivolous feminine hobby, talking to our friends can be a political, revolutionary and deeply important activity.”

For so long, we’ve been pitted against each other as women; told we are small and unworthy and catty. In popular culture and discourse, we’ve been fed the lie that female friendship is inherently bitchy, competitive and vapid. We’ve read that Virginia Woolf and Katherine Mansfield were bitter enemies, rather than complex friends who pushed one another. We’ve seen delighted headlines celebrating feuds between Katy Perry and Taylor Swift, Cardi B and Nicki Minaj, as though female competition is a spectator sport. We’ve been told that gossip is a teenage girl’s vice, that objecting to our roles as women is nagging or whinging, and that raising our voices is shrill. We’ve been cast as brutish man-haters if we dare to speak about feminism, discrimination, sexism, male violence and toxic masculinity. We’ve been pitted against one another by age, race, postcode, sexuality, profession and character. For centuries, we’ve lived with this ridiculous notion that women need to compete with one another to get ahead. As feminist writer Roxane Gay says, “we must abandon the cultural myth that all female friendships must be bitchy, toxic, or competitive. This myth is like heels and purses — pretty but designed to SLOW women down.”

We are now, hopefully, un-learning all of these toxic myths about female solidarity. We are beginning to see that talking amongst friends is one of the most important things we can do for ourselves and for each other. We are recognising that gossip is often the way we communicate fear, that coffee with a girlfriend is a safe space to talk about trauma and that the WhatsApp threads that light up our phones with 47 notifications in one night can be sanctuaries in a world that still feels like it belongs to men.

Befriending, supporting, caring for and listening to another woman is a feminist act. It is an important gesture of solidarity between comrades in an epic fight for our right to be equal members of society. It is also, delightfully, a great source of joy, humour, candour, light, love and hope. Women have a long, well-documented reputation for talking a lot. It’s time to stop seeing that as trivial or whingey or insignificant and see it for what it is: a serious advantage. Women are taught to be communicators and many of us are very good at chatting, gossiping and confiding in one another. Far from being a frivolous feminine hobby, talking to our friends can be a political, revolutionary and deeply important activity. Keep at it. Speak up.