Ypulse Essentials: The 'Truth' About Teen Girls, MTV Backchannel, Bravo's 'Laguna Beach' Knock-off
Posted by anastasia on 09-12-2008
The 'truth' about teen girls (TIME.com on our cultural obsession with teen girls' sexuality)
- MTV Backchannel (a chatty/social/gaming app that you can use while you're watching shows like "The Hills." Plus MTV launches mobile video ads)
- Putting lipstick on 'Laguna Beach'? (Bravo goes after younger viewers with "a docu-soap featuring 'hip and stylish' 18- to 25-year-olds based in Orange County." And more teens tuned into Barack Obama's speech than the premiere of "Gossip Girl.") (Hollywood Reporter) (Media Life Magazine)
- Sanjaya a joke? (New York Times, reg. required, on when celebs are the butt of the joke in ads — and are in on the joke – think: KFed)
- Seth MacFarlane's 'Cavalcade of Cartoon Comedy' (a YouTube hit) (Reel Pop)
- Best high school albums (more of Whitney's Pop Candy High School Survival Guide – I listened to a lot of Black Sabbath junior year…)
- Small Steps (the Ad Council and the government launch a youth video competition focused on preventing obesity. Plus SocialVibe reaches out to high schools with a chance to win $10K)
- Young people using Facebook ads (to find jobs – this was sent in response to yesterday's post about employers looking at social networking profiles) (One Day One Job)
- Wireless companies targeting tweens (lots of stats on tweens and cell phones. Plus young people advising folks on tech purchases even after they've left the nest.) (Fortune) (Ars Technica)
- ur kid is gr8t (parents want texts from school about their kids' progress) (BBC)
P.S. For all of you in the social networking/web space, if you are on the east coast, you should try to attend the Internet Safety Technical Task Force open meeting. This is where the safety rules of the road are being written. The task force has also posted some great research/docs related to internet safety for youth here.
Categorized under: Ypulse Essentials
September 12th, 2008 at 9:18 pm
In response to the Time article, they're pretty much saying the usual fluff, without much critical thought.
People blame the media, or parents, but they're always blaming them for the wrong things – the media for presenting the image, and the parents for not limiting it or explaining that its inaccurate.
What about this as a thesis: as a society, we're ageist, and that has negative consequences for the behavior young people in general display.
We say dumb shit like "this is the best time of your lives" or "you'll never get these years back" or "you'll never look this good again," when in truth, for anyone intelligent, youth is basically the worst time of your life. You're not allowed the freedom of an adult, everyone treats you like you're mildly retarded, you're forced into a socialization process that rewards the creation of a fascist hierarchy, and your brain hasn't yet started to comprehend the emotions of others so you feel alone.
In this kind of society – where sex and sexiness are the only currency, of COURSE teens take this to inappropriate levels. What else can they do?
September 14th, 2008 at 4:38 am
This is really just to agree with the above, I get TIME, but only got around to reading it today.
Anyway, I gotta agree with the above,in response to the TIME article, it's just the usual, "media… blah blah… parents… school… blah… reality shows…" I'd ike some incite into:
A. How to fix the "problem"
B. If it really is a problem, I'll admit, I'm no proponet of waiting until marriage until sex, but still. The article itself mentions that teen pregnancies are actually decreasing. And studies suggest that teens are staying reasonable monagomous.
I've asked myself the question before, "If I had a daughter who watched The OC and wore thongs, would it bother me?" I find myself generally answering No.
September 17th, 2008 at 3:10 pm
Thanks for the links.
I agree that the article is incomplete in its assessment of the problem, but then again every article is. I agree with the Time article in so far that media is a part of the problem. Not very original, but I really applaud the very end of it: "Maybe we believe so readily in notions like a plague of teen sex because they titillate us, the grownups." Well said. We rarely want to point the finger at ourselves as a part of the problem.