Naomi Wolf is in the NYT today answering questions about her recent column on teen girl fiction. I give her a lot of credit for responding to the questions - clearly it wasn't only lit bloggers who were taking sides about what she had to say. I do think that much of this will go right over the heads of the girls reading the books though (as one young girl asks, aren't adults writing these books in the first place?).

This exchange made me think for a moment:
Q. 2. Do you see this as a harmless outlet that girls will inevitably outgrow, or as something that will interfere with girls' developing a mature sense of empathy? — Kevin Snapp, Chicago, Ill.

"Girls are very resilient and we have already heard from many girls who read these books with a lot of critical alertness. That said, I do think the meanness glamorized in some of these books makes it more difficult for parents to persuade kids that that behavior is truly beyond the pale; this problem is not gender-specific — it is a continuation of the increasing rudeness and nasty behavior that is being promoted in kids' culture — TV, film — generally."

I happened to be going over some other stuff while reading Wolf's column and I couldn't help but think how off base her assertion was about "increasing rudeness and nasty behavior, etc." I was looking at a picture of the 1955 Central High School integration - when the Little Rock 9 were going into school protected by federal marshalls and surrounded by screaming teenagers (many of them girls) yelling racial slurs, and threats.

I just don't see how things are oh so much worse now.

My mother and I had a conversation kind of like this recently; she blames Roseanne and the Simpsons for rudeness in the school where she counsels, but I disagree. I also think that just because her generation was taught to say "yes sir, no sir" doesn't make it better. Those are also the kids that had no problem doing whatever a Catholic priest (or any other adult in charge) told them to do - no matter how wrong - and they were more willing to believe adults over their own children 20 years later when it happened again.

Just because you're a grown-up doesn't mean you deserve anyone's respect, particularly a child's.

I don't know, I think some aspects of teen culture are always going to be cruel and mean. It's not right and it's not good but my memories of junior high and high school are full of girls who would crucify you with words for wearing the wrong pants or shirt or whatever. I can remember the nightmare that was the locker room when I was 13 and many times that young girls were moved to tears because they were picked on for what they looked like in their underwear.

Some girls are bitches, and I imagine their mothers are too.

It would be great if we could take away all the books and movies and that made everything better. But at the end of the day mean teenagers are only acting human. Today we started bombing Iraq again to defeat "the insurgents" (whoever the hell they are), a govenrment lawyer was put on leave for blatantly defying the law in the Moussari trial (and puting the whole trial in jeopardy - thank heavens at least the judge still cares about the Constitution), and the Enron mess limps along with everyone crying that they didn't realize it would get so out of hand. (Yeah, right.) Oh yeah - and Slobodan Milosovic has gone home to Serbia where the faithful mourn him still and believe that he was a good man, that all the stories are just lies.

This is what humans do, we hurt each other. We lie, we cheat, we steal, and we inflict pain and we have been doing it forever. We do it at 5 when we take someone else's toy and we do it at 15 and 35 and 55 and hell, many of us never stop. It isn't good, I wish it would change, but it is the world today. Children are dying right now in Uganda trying to flee a madman and we aren't bombing him. No, we aren't even paying attention to him.

We aren't doing anything about him.

If you want to help teenage girls be better people then spend the money to buy copies of A Wrinkle in Time, the His Dark Materials series, Boy Proof, Queen of Cool, Going Going, Under the Persimmon Tree, Down the Rabbit Hole, Kalpana's Dream, The Outcasts of Schyler Place and on and on. You want some ideas for good teen lit? I have ideas, there are ideas all over the web. They like romance or mystery or sci fi? There are plenty of great titles out there. Don't take away the stupid shit they are reading, just make available something better. Give them the opportunity to reach for something better.

Let's not be crazy and over react about this, not this time. Let's just show them what good books are.

Now if you'll excuse me I'm going to go do some writing of my own, on a book that is hopeful, because honest to God, I just don't know how the women who write those Gossip Girls and Clique books can stand to put those words on paper. That's the read mystery here - why doesn't somebody find out why they are writing this crap in the first place?

Well?