PLUS: ‘Mean Girls’ problem a ‘hoax’, taxing soda, and cursing in the movies
Teens Charged in Bullying Death — Criminal charges have been filed against nine teenagers connected to the suicide of 15-year-old Phoebe Prince in South Hadley, Mass. Many suspect that Prince, a pretty immigrant from Ireland, was “bullied” into killing herself, and derogatory remarks about the girl showed up on her Facebook page even after her death. School administrators also have been criticized for not implementing all the suggestions of a school bullying expert, who was called in just months before Prince’s death. But some students believe that the bullying Prince endured wasn’t grossly out of the ordinary. “A lot of it was normal girl drama,” says one teen. If you want to label it bullying, then I’ve bullied girls and girls have bullied me. Her history made it affect her more. It wasn’t the school being terrible. It was really bad, it was one of the worst things I’ve heard of some girls doing to another girl. But it wouldn’t have hurt most people that much.” (Slate)
‘Mean Girls’ on the Rise? — Attention to the Prince tragedy has led many people to ask themselves whether girls are just nastier to each other these days. People magazine even ran an article titled “Mean Girls,” suggesting that girl-to-girl malevolence, be it cyberbullying or flat-out fighting, is perhaps a growing problem. But stats suggest that the so-called “mean girl” phenomenon is, in the words of New York Times contributors Mike Males and Meda-Chesney Lind, “a hoax.” According to the writers, most credible statistics indicate that girl-perpetrated violence is going down, not up: For instance, the FBI reports that girls arrested for violent crimes has shrunk by 32 percent between 1995 and 2008. “Why,” write Males and Lind, “in an era when slandering a group of people based on the misdeeds of a few has rightly become taboo, does it remain acceptable to use isolated incidents to berate modern teenagers, particularly girls, as ‘mean’ and ‘violent’ and ‘bullies’? That is, why are we bullying girls?” (New York Times)
Don’t Give Me That So-So Soda Tax — Legislators, wringing their hands over the rising obesity of the nation’s children, have taken to taxing sodas in order to discourage kids from buying them. Turns out, though, the taxes don’t seem to be helping much. According to research from Rand Corp. and the University of Illinois at Chicago, a one-percent sales tax on soda equates to a .013 drop in a child’s body-mass index—barely enough to trouble with. States levy, on average, about a 4.2-percent tax on pop—more than three times higher than they tax most other foods, but a fraction of what researchers say would really make children cut down on their carbonated beverage intake. (Los Angeles Times)
Teens Harbingers of Healthier Economy — After nearly two years of forced frugality, teens are spending again, and retailers couldn’t be happier. Teenagers, unhampered by debt and prone to impulse buying, are among the economy’s most reliable shoppers. So when youth deserted malls in droves the last couple of years, the economy felt the impact. “Bank of Mom and Dad—on pretty much all income levels—basically shut down in the back end of ’08 and the beginning of ’09,” says Christine Chen, retail analyst for Needham and Co. But teen-oriented retailers have seen a turnaround, and that may signal that the economy is rebounding in earnest. Abercrombie & Fitch saw its sales rise by 8 percent in January after 20 straight months of in-the-red ledgers, and teens seem ready to spend. “The deals are great, and it makes us want to shop,” says Makenna Spiegel, 14. “So we may as well get more.” (Los Angeles Times)
Success … Guaranteed? — There are no guarantees in life. Unless, of course, you go to Lansing (Mich.) Community College. The college, located in a community where unemployment is hovering around the 12-percent mark, recently instituted a guarantee: Take six-week courses that apply toward degrees in a handful of career tracks, and the school promises you’ll have a job within a year. And, if you don’t, the school will refund the tuition. Granted, there are restrictions: The guarantees apply to only 61 applicants—the best and brightest of those who apply. They can’t miss any classes or assignments, and they have to go through employability skill training and attend job fairs. Oh, and they have to prove to the school that they’re applying for jobs. In short, the community college is trying to ensure no one has opportunity to cash in on the guarantee. “We’ve had employers who’ve heard about this call us,” says Ellen Jones, Lansing’s director of public affairs. “They want these people.” (Time)
Quote: “If I ever uttered one word that I said in [the film], I would be grounded for years!” “I’d be stuck in my room until I was 20! I would never in a million years say that.” — 13-year-old actress Chloe Moretz, who plays Hit-Girl in the film Kick-A**, discussing with MTV her on-screen utterance of the c-word. Moretz, who was 11 at the time of filming, admitted to The Scotsman that when she talks about the movie at home, she calls it “Kick-Butt.” (MTV)
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