Inspired by some colleagues’ fun chat of the pre-mtg talk(the first 5min after the meeting started while waiting for everyone to join the video call), I decided to make an important cultural catch-up of US teenage girl s’ world— watch the iconic(per my teenage daughter) movie aired in 2004, The “Mean Girls”
I loved it! And highly recommend to all the first generation immigrant parents raising your kids esp. girls if you haven’t watched it — it’s an important education. And if your kids haven’t watched it, watch it together with them if appropriate. My girls’ eyes shined when I proposed to watch it together with them — and even after years, both girls could remember not only all the main characters’ name in the film, but they also remember most of the scripts in the film! I really hope all the study they are going thru in the school can be like this film to them:)
I loved it in many ways and mostly it is so real — Although I’ve never studied in US myself, based on the 7 years I learnt through my two lovely girls’ experience in 4 different schools(public and private, elementary, junior high and high school), I do think it’s very real and still happening today in most of the schools.
As a social animal, our brain is hardwired wanting to feel belong to a group instead of being alone (there is definitely exception like Elon Musk), that’s why since we start our social life at schools, we constantly work very hard to to form or join different groups by finding the common attributes like:
- BioGender: Girls, Boys
- Race: Asian, Black, White etc.
- Interest: Sports, Math, Dance
- Hometown: Californian, Texan, New Yorker
- Native Language: American English, British English, Singlish
- Academic performance: Smart ones, dumb ones
- Political preference: Liberal, Progressive, Conservative
I am not a sociologist, but I do think this kind behavior(Forming groups, to feel superior by looking down or taking down other groups etc.) is deeply rooted in our ancient gene as human beings, there is no way to really get rid of it since it’s part of the deal of being a human being.
While I am not saying we have nothing to do — just like the Math teacher did in the end of the movie to help every girls to *clear* the air with other girls who they had conflicts. We can do a lot to address this dark side of human being’s needs. The answer is *Diversity, Kindness and Trust* help everyone to not only feel better, but actually achieve more collectively since you do NOT need to stay up at the night thinking and strategizing about which groups you need to join or fight and how.
Btw, just learnt that this film’s writer was Tina Fey who starred in this film as the Math teacher Ms. Norbury, she is so talented to be great on both writing a sensational film and being a great actress not only in this one but also the recent one like “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot”. While even it was a great movie in my opinion, it failed commercially (grossing only $24.9 million against its $35 million budget.)
