“What advice would you give college women?” I braced myself for both the hysterical remarks and insightful observations I have come to expect from my 7th grade little women I tutor once a week. “Stop drinking!” ” Stop dancing with 30 guys at frat houses!” “Stop smoking!” I laughed at their immediate responses, obviously influenced (arguably entirely shaped) by pop culture including movies, songs, and ah, yes, the age old corrupting MTV.Â
Wait, they do know that Jersey Shore does NOT in fact entail any form of education, right?… Note to self for next week. I got this one, promise.
What I thought would turn out as a silly, fun, yet interesting article soon had me with notebook and pen in hand scribbling ferociously as they spoke so freely to me. I realized there was a lot more disturbing ideas they had aside from the party-all-day-and-all-night views of college women (and college students in general). Gazing at me confidently, feeling important enough to credibly advise any college woman, their comments were short and sweet but the meanings behind them deep. As a society, we seriously need to question: What are we teaching our little women?
Imani told me, “They go too fast with everything..move too fast with relationships. I know you have all that freedom and no parents and all…but I think they move too fast. “This 13-year-old had quite the valid point. She really didn’t have to say much else to convince me.
We are constantly running and rushing; gotta finish homework, projects, gotta get to work, gotta grab dinner with roomates, then off to a meeting, then finish that paper you procrastinated doing. Is it possible that this overdrive mode that we’ve all unconsciously accepted as a lifestyle has spilled over into aspects of our life that by nature require time? Confused? Well, relationships would be one example. How many times have you met a guy, sworn he’s different and better than the rest within the first week, ditched school work and other plans to hang with him every night, and all but have his name on your lease by the end of the first month? While it’s true that relationships will inevitably move faster in a college setting due to our close proximity and amount of time spent together, there would be some advantages to stepping back and slowing down a bit. Maybe they wouldn’t all end as abruptly as they began.
Qateyrha and Malaisha both made comments about smoking, drinking, and partying. “Stop smoking weed,” Qateyrha said. “Why do you think they do that?” I asked her. “Because I know they go to parties and do wild stuff,” she replied matter of factly. Malaysia told me that college women need to stop dancing with a bunch of guys at frat parties. Her reply to how she knew that they did this was “Movies.”
College women, supposedly and ideally the “role models” for these growing, young students are all party animals that hop from one frat house to another smoking weed and grinding on guys along the way… At least that’s what the media is portraying us to be. I thought of movies they may have seen that would give them these ideas. Movies like How High, House Bunny, American Pie, Van Wilder, Old School, even Legally Blonde all reiterate the ideas of what college is and should be, particularly to this younger audience. Of course, these are all classic college movies that we’ve all enjoyed probably over and over. Nothing wrong with that. However, I tried to think of a recent movie whose main character was a strong, intelligent college woman. I couldn’t. (The closest I came was Inception if you want to count that, although she was far from the main character.)
The girls somehow made around to asking me during our casual interview if I had a boyfriend. “No,” I said the same way I would answer any question. Their outbursts were as loud and passionate, if not more, than when I asked them for advice to college women. “But, why Miss Deri?!” “Miss Deri, you are pretty! Why don’t you have a boyfriend?!” They looked at me with genuine concern in their eyes. After all, not having a boyfriend and being 21 is definitely reason for concern, especially if you are pretty, according to my girls. Their argument goes as follows:
All girls want boyfriends.
Pretty girls can always get a boyfriend.
Therefore, Miss Deri should have a boyfriend.
I could go on about this one forever but I think you get the point. Why do we teach our girls that having a boyfriend is something they should always be trying for? Even worse is why they think that only pretty girls can always get boyfriends while ugly girls can not.
Something they had never considered was that not all girls want boyfriends. They did not see this as an option but rather a privilege that “pretty girls” have. We instill these ideas, images of perfection, desire to be beautiful, and always having or at least striving for a boyfriend into their minds. We even corrupt the idea of college for them and turn into a huge drunken, sexual playground.
My hope is that these ideas are not so instilled that the self fulfilling prophecy occurs with these girls eventually going off to college only to drink, party, smoke, and dance with “30 frat guys” because that is what they think they’re supposed to do there.
For as we all know, if the real parties were anything like they were in the movies, the frats wouldn’t be out of their Natural Ice at 10:30 pm and we’d all be ditzy playboy bunnies every single weekend.
Thanks and shout out to my smart, little women for the interview!
Qateyrha, Imani, Maiya, Malaisha, and Desirae :)