Schools were once places where girls in drab A-line skirts could concentrate on other things than looking perfect. Not any more. We now live in a world “where eight-year-olds worry about their weight, 11-year-olds feel they need to pluck their eyebrows” and teenage schoolgirls are expected to be “selfie-ready” at all times. And attempts to counter this trend get short shrift. A recent school-trip letter which laid down that girls should wear no make-up except “subtle lip gloss”, and could wear either cropped tops or short skirts but not both, was ridiculed as sexist on social media. In the 1980s, my school friends and I would have killed for the freedom to wear lip gloss and short skirts: we just didn’t know how lucky we were in being free to be frumpy. (Gaby Hinsliff, The Guardian)
I have noticed, among the (small) number of young people I know, that grumpy, monosyllabic puberty seems to be starting at eight or nine, and that as early as fifteen or sixteen civilisation seems to be taking tenuous hold. I personally remember being boorishly rebellious at the great age of seventeen, but not at nine. But now it seems that kids, especially girls, are growing up incredibly early, and may not be getting any dreamy youth at all to speak of, which is incredibly sad. Of course, it’s all about Facebook, I suppose. One gets teased if you don’t have a Facebook presence, teased if you have less than five hundred “friends”, and socially dead if you don’t, in person and on your page, look like a model on a runway. The sexualisation of young girls is no light matter. The suicide rate among teenagers is disturbingly high, and it appears to be social pressure that causes the problems. How have we allowed this to happen and what, if anything, can be done about it?
Well I’m still technically a teenager, and I was at school until very recently, so even though I’m a man hopefully I can offer my suggestions.
This may shock conservatives, but we actually need more individualism. The problem with a strong collective culture is that it creates expectations that some feel alienated by and are reluctant to live up to. In the case of the modern day waste, the culture is as you say, that young women should always looks their best and be super sociable. But even if that wasn’t the culture, the very existence of collective expectation creates standards that some will find doesn’t fit them. For instance, many girls genuinely love looking pretty and grown up, and that’s fine, but it’s not for everyone. We need to let people be who they want, even if we don’t personally approve on their choices. That’s better than the alternative: an unhappy people.
We also need reforms in the media and celebrity culture. Girls used to look up to political leaders, military personell, scientists, religious leaders, philosophers and other wise people. Now they mostly look up to celebrities, models and terrible pop stars. That ought to change. Feminism could play a role in promoting better role models. Better and more accurate representation of women in the media would certainly help.
But we also need realism. I find the modern day female utterly bizarre and incongruous. More recently, I’ve simply accepted that they’ll do things I find totally unappealing. We can critique female culture and behaviour, but I highly doubt we’ll be able to reform it along the lines that we believe to be ideal.
Thank you for your thoughtful and reassuring comments, Owen. I wish everyone was so meadured and wise.