Thanks to Robert French for plugging PRGirlz on infOpinions. Though he’s enthusiastic about the prospect of some PR professionals of the female persuasion joining the testosterone-laden blogosphere (ugh, that word again), he’s not so happy we’ve called ourselves “girlz” or even girls. In fact, he implores his female students to refrain from ever calling themselves girls.

Rest assured, Professor French, we know our name is cheesy and have tongues planted firmly in cheek. (The name got us some ink, did it not?) We’ve each been around along enough to have heard all the nonsense about “PR bunnies” (or “Fluffy bunnies” as I’ve heard them called in the UK) and we don’t think anyone will confuse us as such. In fact, we did a straw poll and it seems the PR Girl that Professor French describes – “images of vacuous little pretty girls as office dressing and shuffled off to perform clerical duties deemed to be beneath PR management, which is most often male” – is somewhat of an urban myth, like the alligators in the sewer and the guy who steals your organs. Maybe they’re out there, but we haven’t met them.

You can tell your female students that we think a sea change is happening in the business - as the baby boomers shuffle off into their retirement homes, the ratio in management will likely look more like the ratio at all other levels. Hopefully, anyway. And then we “girlz” won’t have to be so concerned about semantics.