Hey guys. I’m just gonna come out and, like, say it. This year, I’m becoming a full-blown bimbo.

I know what you’re thinking, lol. You’re probably thinking that’s a really stupid thing to say.

Which is the point entirely.

“Bimbofication” – the scientific term for becoming stupid and hot – has been bouncing around the internet for a few years now.

It started out on TikTok, with American creators like Chrissy Chlapecka embracing a very specific brand of hyperfemininity. Wearing highly-flammable hair extensions and skin-tight polyester outfits, Chlapecka speaks to the camera in a baby voice, discussing everything from politics and mental illness, right through to “the feminine urge to buy my stupid little $7 coffee & stare at my stupid little thousand dollar phone to fill the void”.

And not gonna lie, when I first saw her videos, I was conflicted. On the one hand, they spoke to me aesthetically. I’m outrageously attracted to the colour pink. But on the other hand, which I should clarify is manicured, I was irritated. Why was she speaking like that? Why was this bleach blonde, big-bosomed woman talking like a toddler?

I couldn’t work it out. Then I realised I’m not meant to.

The ethos of the 2022 bimbo is to have “less thoughts” and “more vibes”. It’s a purposeful rejection of my generation’s propensity to catastrophise and diagnose. And after two years of uncertainty, we’ve come to realise there’s no point in trying to out-think things like pandemics or mathematics. It’s easier to just be hot.

And for this gorgeous gorgeous girl, it feels like a return to centre.

I’ve always wanted to be a bimbo, in my heart of hearts. I think it’s got something to do with being a kid in the noughties. I grew up on a diet of Playboy bunnies and Pussycat Dolls. And it’s a miracle I didn’t grow up on a diet, full stop.

In Y2K pop culture, almost every woman who was afforded ample screen time was impossibly attractive and in some way, a bimbo. With Legally Blonde the rare exception, the women in these movies were a bit silly at best, and at worst, morally corrupt.

Take for example Mean Girls.

While I’m sure the message Tiny Fey was hoping to send when she wrote Regina George was that being a vain, popular bitch is bad and increases your chances of being hit by a bus, my eight-year-old self missed the point entirely.

I wanted to be her. I wanted to drive a convertible Lexus. I wanted to be the most popular girl in school. And if I needed to be a bimbo to get there, I’d oblige.

In this early 2000s version of bimbofication, the very act of performative femininity was considered vapid and worthy of ridicule. Women were just one more “like” or “umm” away from being cast off entirely, relegated to the aisle of Chemist Warehouse that stocks Paris Hilton’s eau de toilette.

And it wasn’t just men who had a thing or two to say about women who wore their jeans slung low and their g-strings high with pride. Books such as Female Chauvinist Pigs by Ariel Levy put the “phenomenon” of “raunch culture” on blast, suggesting women who wore Playboy bunny paraphernalia were making themselves the butt of the joke. A taut one at that.

As a young girl who loved pink, this left me with few options. I hated physical sports and loved going to Kmart to nag my parents for new Bratz Dolls and a pack of Lip Smackers. I knew, though, that wearing a miniskirt probably lowered my IQ. There was no option to be hot and smart.

And that’s why this new wave of self-aware bimbofication is so deeply exciting. We’re entering the decade of the bimbo, I can feel it in my 300CC breast implants. We’re reclaiming the word, appliquéing it with rhinestones and presenting it on the internet, in our own, like, words. Then we’re lying back down on our fluffy pink pillows to get our beauty sleep because we’re not pressed on whether you like it or not.

Unlike the earlier manifestations of bimbofication, anyone can be one in 2022. Men, women, theys and thems. Luxuriating in extreme femme energy is our version of burning our bras – only this time it’s our fingers click-clacking across the keyboard, celebrating bimbocentric causes like Britney Spears’ emancipation.

So here’s my pledge. In 2022, I’m going to be the dumbest person I know. I’m going to stop removing the excess exclamation marks in my emails … a technique I used to employ so people might take me more seriously!!! And sorry, I’m not going to rein in my use of the word “sorry”.

I’m not going to unsoften myself in order to be taken seriously. I’m going to walk on a treadmill in a full face of makeup, listening to Kim Petras sing about her coconuts, nodding along because yass queen. Do you know what I mean?

If you don’t, that’s OK. In fact, that’s hot.