Several girls started picking on me in the sixth grade in the Chicago Public School we went to. It was the same months during which my mother was dying of cancer, though I don't think the girls knew this. I lived farther from school, had no siblings, and didn't go to Catholic church, where all of their families knew each other (I later found out). So I was easy to single out. They mocked me a lot and then sent me a mean fake valentine from a boy they knew I liked. It really has left me hesitant to stick my neck out in life -- of course, that effect also came from losing my mother and having a depressed dad. And I imagine those girls had been picked on too. I imagine it's a never-ending chain of picking-on-somebody. But that was a painful time that wrecked the rest of grade school. If people had known of my loss and had been kind, I think those years would have left me feeling a lot more positive during my teens.
I'm going to share one that's NOT mine but I think about it a lot. My best friend was part of a group of women who met monthly. They had a Facebook group to organize their events (as they grew from monthly meetings to other activities like 5Ks, vacations, concerts, etc.). Eventually there was another secret Facebook group that several created to talk about a few people in the group of 12-15 women that they didn't like. And then there was ANOTHER secret Facebook group that several in that first secret Facebook group created to talk about a few people in the smaller group that they didn't like. When my friend told me about it (I knew some of the women in the main group) and who the anti-groups were about I'd think about it every time I'd see those women on the outs who had NO IDEA how much meanness was being discussed about them among a group they considered some of their best friends. At one point I asked my friend, "Why do you let X stay in the group when you all hate her so much?" She said, "Because if we didn't have her to hate we'd probably turn on each other." Yikes.
Mean Girls never ends because imo there are personalities that relish denigrating those they perceive as different or weaker than they are…it starts in about fourth grade, maybe earlier. It’s a form of bullying. Girls do it the way you see it play out in The Bad Art Friend and boys do it through physicality. Hopefully, maturity changes mean girls and they develop empathy and stop participating in gossip and snark against other women at some point in their development. I think it’s a function of group dynamics similar to the way animals (think chickens, etc.) act. A weak link in the chain may be ostracized from the tribe. In more developed collectives, instead of being targeted, weak links are protected and assisted by the stronger, (elephants?) Unfortunately, the majority of humans grow old but do not grow emotionally or spiritually. Instead, they fail to develop or grow into their full potential. Those who stay stunted support each other in staying that way. Ok, I need another cup of coffee.
I truly believe that many of the relationships we attract as adults replicate the ones we had as kids, and young adults--the ones that tortured us and kept us up nights, made us crazy and broke our hearts to the strains of the popular 1970s line "I'll be ya best friend..."---simply as a subconscious way to attend unfinished business, or even more, to rewrite the script and its ending. As a kid, I had a long history of aligning myself with unkind friends, because I thought they'd be different with me; of course, they never were, and I was often dumped, gaslighted, bullied. In 1977, when I was fourteen, I was ghosted by every single one of my female classmates out of the blue, for an entire year; I attempted suicide (naturally, my mother doesn't recall any of this) and when we returned to school the following September, everyone was friendly again, and they acted like it never happened. At 58 and a reasonably public figure in some circles, I still find myself attracted to people known for their unkindness. I still believe it'll be different this time, and I'm still surprised when it's not, when I'm the unwitting subject of gossip. But my response now is to cut off all ties. That said: why allow it to happen to begin with?
When I was in 8th grade or so, some girls took me into the restroom and played with my hair, put some makeup on me, and said, "You could be cute if you tried." I tried. Got drunk with the popular girls at my house. Told head cheerleader she was a bitch. Made her cry. I kept drinking, including at school, and pretty soon the only way I could find my way out of the in-crowd was to overdose and arrange myself for my parents to find. I missed my true self: drawing, writing, reading, wandering in the forest. One of the girls later came over and said "We made a vow to keep you from reaching the top. There's only room for one person up there." She said she felt guilty for my overdose. I laughed. Yes, I'm still shocked when I meet women with that mean girl attitude, but it still makes me laugh. And sigh. I'm so grateful for my women friends who don't need to play the mean girl games.
My 7th grade Mean Girl experience devastated me. It came in the form of a note, handed to me while passing in the hallway, a list of why no one wanted to be my friend anymore. I'm 64 and I still have the note, so does it resonate? It sure does. For years it was a reminder of what you risked if you trusted people. Now it's a symbol of who I was, the power I simply handed over to others, and thank goodness (a lot of therapy and 30+ years of recovery later) I'm not that person anymore. It breaks my heart that the hurt I felt, the anger it turned into was not only turned inward, but worse, I allowed it to turn me into someone else's mean girl, a bully who took it out on others further down the hierarchal ladder that is high school.
Mean girls never end, but what can end is your relationship with them, accepting them into your life. I didn't have a large group of girlfriends (mean or not) growing up, and when I was faced with the 'mean-girl archetype' in my 30s, as part of a larger group of girlfriends, I was a bit shocked that the phenomenon still existed at "their age". I was suddenly grateful I missed that experience when in high school.
However far I keep myself from them, I still find that 'mean girls' are the reason why I have impostor syndrome and I don't publish more of my work...
The mean girl phenomenon never really ends. The only difference I think for me is that now as an adult, having switched to full time academia from full time journalism, the mean girls tend to be old, tenured white women who spend their time finding ways to disavow me of credit for the work I do. I thought it was just me but I've spoken to other women of color in academia and it seems to be a phenomenon where our achievements are diminished while any flaws that may be there highlighted in every possible way. I have so many examples of exclusionary and sexist behavior from other women in my academic department that it would take a whole essay and a half to break it down. Really unfortunate.
i’m curious about this idea of “mean girls” i don’t hear of “mean boys”. i was hurt by friends in high school, i was mean to friends in middle school. we were all children navigating power dynamics, hormones, communication etc. for the first times, it is a perfect storm for hurt. girls aren’t inherently nicer or better able to navigate difficult emotions & it’s an odd expectation.
I’ve run into it with one former friend. The community she lives in appears to be full of woman drama. She was both on the receiving end of mean girls (which really troubled her) and on the giving end (telling someone to stay away from her social network). That community was way too incestuous. Luckily, I am not and never have been a part of it. I live in a different part of the country and don’t know them.
It doesn’t matter how old or wise we believe ourselves to be, I’ll agree that mean girl moves may very well be inherently human. I’ve been the butt of many mean girl while growing up, but I’m ashamed to admit I pulled a mean girl move this week by making some disparaging remarks about one classmate to another classmate. As I read the discovered texts thread in this article guilt flooded over me and prompted me to apologize to the classmate I ranted to. I’ve come to the Zen conclusion that similar things keep happening to me because these things still elicit the same irritated feelings in me and it’s high time I learned to let them roll off me like water on a duck like I do most other irritations…
It never ends. I see it regularly. The big difference is I just care less and don’t take things as personally as I used to, a benefit of getting older.
Oh god, where to begin? I remember burying myself in my sleeping bag at one particularly painful sleepover party, braving suffocation to avoid any more cruelty. I was ten.
Several girls started picking on me in the sixth grade in the Chicago Public School we went to. It was the same months during which my mother was dying of cancer, though I don't think the girls knew this. I lived farther from school, had no siblings, and didn't go to Catholic church, where all of their families knew each other (I later found out). So I was easy to single out. They mocked me a lot and then sent me a mean fake valentine from a boy they knew I liked. It really has left me hesitant to stick my neck out in life -- of course, that effect also came from losing my mother and having a depressed dad. And I imagine those girls had been picked on too. I imagine it's a never-ending chain of picking-on-somebody. But that was a painful time that wrecked the rest of grade school. If people had known of my loss and had been kind, I think those years would have left me feeling a lot more positive during my teens.
I'm going to share one that's NOT mine but I think about it a lot. My best friend was part of a group of women who met monthly. They had a Facebook group to organize their events (as they grew from monthly meetings to other activities like 5Ks, vacations, concerts, etc.). Eventually there was another secret Facebook group that several created to talk about a few people in the group of 12-15 women that they didn't like. And then there was ANOTHER secret Facebook group that several in that first secret Facebook group created to talk about a few people in the smaller group that they didn't like. When my friend told me about it (I knew some of the women in the main group) and who the anti-groups were about I'd think about it every time I'd see those women on the outs who had NO IDEA how much meanness was being discussed about them among a group they considered some of their best friends. At one point I asked my friend, "Why do you let X stay in the group when you all hate her so much?" She said, "Because if we didn't have her to hate we'd probably turn on each other." Yikes.
Mean Girls never ends because imo there are personalities that relish denigrating those they perceive as different or weaker than they are…it starts in about fourth grade, maybe earlier. It’s a form of bullying. Girls do it the way you see it play out in The Bad Art Friend and boys do it through physicality. Hopefully, maturity changes mean girls and they develop empathy and stop participating in gossip and snark against other women at some point in their development. I think it’s a function of group dynamics similar to the way animals (think chickens, etc.) act. A weak link in the chain may be ostracized from the tribe. In more developed collectives, instead of being targeted, weak links are protected and assisted by the stronger, (elephants?) Unfortunately, the majority of humans grow old but do not grow emotionally or spiritually. Instead, they fail to develop or grow into their full potential. Those who stay stunted support each other in staying that way. Ok, I need another cup of coffee.
I truly believe that many of the relationships we attract as adults replicate the ones we had as kids, and young adults--the ones that tortured us and kept us up nights, made us crazy and broke our hearts to the strains of the popular 1970s line "I'll be ya best friend..."---simply as a subconscious way to attend unfinished business, or even more, to rewrite the script and its ending. As a kid, I had a long history of aligning myself with unkind friends, because I thought they'd be different with me; of course, they never were, and I was often dumped, gaslighted, bullied. In 1977, when I was fourteen, I was ghosted by every single one of my female classmates out of the blue, for an entire year; I attempted suicide (naturally, my mother doesn't recall any of this) and when we returned to school the following September, everyone was friendly again, and they acted like it never happened. At 58 and a reasonably public figure in some circles, I still find myself attracted to people known for their unkindness. I still believe it'll be different this time, and I'm still surprised when it's not, when I'm the unwitting subject of gossip. But my response now is to cut off all ties. That said: why allow it to happen to begin with?
When I was in 8th grade or so, some girls took me into the restroom and played with my hair, put some makeup on me, and said, "You could be cute if you tried." I tried. Got drunk with the popular girls at my house. Told head cheerleader she was a bitch. Made her cry. I kept drinking, including at school, and pretty soon the only way I could find my way out of the in-crowd was to overdose and arrange myself for my parents to find. I missed my true self: drawing, writing, reading, wandering in the forest. One of the girls later came over and said "We made a vow to keep you from reaching the top. There's only room for one person up there." She said she felt guilty for my overdose. I laughed. Yes, I'm still shocked when I meet women with that mean girl attitude, but it still makes me laugh. And sigh. I'm so grateful for my women friends who don't need to play the mean girl games.
My 7th grade Mean Girl experience devastated me. It came in the form of a note, handed to me while passing in the hallway, a list of why no one wanted to be my friend anymore. I'm 64 and I still have the note, so does it resonate? It sure does. For years it was a reminder of what you risked if you trusted people. Now it's a symbol of who I was, the power I simply handed over to others, and thank goodness (a lot of therapy and 30+ years of recovery later) I'm not that person anymore. It breaks my heart that the hurt I felt, the anger it turned into was not only turned inward, but worse, I allowed it to turn me into someone else's mean girl, a bully who took it out on others further down the hierarchal ladder that is high school.
Mean girls never end, but what can end is your relationship with them, accepting them into your life. I didn't have a large group of girlfriends (mean or not) growing up, and when I was faced with the 'mean-girl archetype' in my 30s, as part of a larger group of girlfriends, I was a bit shocked that the phenomenon still existed at "their age". I was suddenly grateful I missed that experience when in high school.
However far I keep myself from them, I still find that 'mean girls' are the reason why I have impostor syndrome and I don't publish more of my work...
The mean girl phenomenon never really ends. The only difference I think for me is that now as an adult, having switched to full time academia from full time journalism, the mean girls tend to be old, tenured white women who spend their time finding ways to disavow me of credit for the work I do. I thought it was just me but I've spoken to other women of color in academia and it seems to be a phenomenon where our achievements are diminished while any flaws that may be there highlighted in every possible way. I have so many examples of exclusionary and sexist behavior from other women in my academic department that it would take a whole essay and a half to break it down. Really unfortunate.
i’m curious about this idea of “mean girls” i don’t hear of “mean boys”. i was hurt by friends in high school, i was mean to friends in middle school. we were all children navigating power dynamics, hormones, communication etc. for the first times, it is a perfect storm for hurt. girls aren’t inherently nicer or better able to navigate difficult emotions & it’s an odd expectation.
I’ve run into it with one former friend. The community she lives in appears to be full of woman drama. She was both on the receiving end of mean girls (which really troubled her) and on the giving end (telling someone to stay away from her social network). That community was way too incestuous. Luckily, I am not and never have been a part of it. I live in a different part of the country and don’t know them.
It never ends.
It doesn’t matter how old or wise we believe ourselves to be, I’ll agree that mean girl moves may very well be inherently human. I’ve been the butt of many mean girl while growing up, but I’m ashamed to admit I pulled a mean girl move this week by making some disparaging remarks about one classmate to another classmate. As I read the discovered texts thread in this article guilt flooded over me and prompted me to apologize to the classmate I ranted to. I’ve come to the Zen conclusion that similar things keep happening to me because these things still elicit the same irritated feelings in me and it’s high time I learned to let them roll off me like water on a duck like I do most other irritations…
It never ends. I see it regularly. The big difference is I just care less and don’t take things as personally as I used to, a benefit of getting older.
Mean girls never end - Men are better friends, they don't require as much maintenance.
Oh god, where to begin? I remember burying myself in my sleeping bag at one particularly painful sleepover party, braving suffocation to avoid any more cruelty. I was ten.