By RANDYE HODER
It used to be that the only people concerned about getting caught in grungy sweat pants, sans makeup, were starlets stalked by the paparazzi. But in today’s hyper-public Internet age, young teenagers are relentlessly living their lives camera-ready — and it’s not a pretty picture.
I first noticed this while looking over my 14-year-old son’s shoulder at photos of his “friends” on Facebook. Girls, in particular, seemed to be always posing — in some cases vamping — for the camera: hair swept back, hand on hip, dressed just so. In at least a few instances, they looked as if they were auditioning for a Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue, clad in bikinis that left little to the imagination.
Creating a persona via Facebook is nothing new. Kids have been doing this since the site was first launched eight years ago (and even before that with MySpace and LiveJournal). By carefully selecting their own profile pictures, making public comments, and curating the photos they post, younger teenagers have become quite adept at managing their image.
But what is relatively new — and occurring with increasing frequency — is that the glare of the camera is never far away. And that is affecting how adolescent girls conduct themselves in their actual, everyday lives. Girls this age, who have felt pressured historically to look their best most of the time, suddenly seem to feel as if they need to look their best all of the time. In turn, always being “on” seems to lead some girls to pose for pictures that are oversexualized: pouting lips, lots of cleavage, short-shorts, crop tops that showcase a bare midriff.
Technology, of course, is the driver. With it now commonplace for middle-school students to have smartphones, they are able to snap pictures — any time and any place — and instantly upload them to Facebook. Mobile uploads (“muploads,” as some call them), not to mention the pervasive use of video chatting, have made it nearly impossible to escape the spotlight.
“Before a video chat, I’ll fix my hair and make sure that I look good,” said Grace, an eighth-grader. “If I just got out of the shower and my hair is wet, or I’m wearing my sweats, I’ll cover the camera with a Post-it, or I just won’t accept the video chat.”
Added Jordan, a 13-year-old: “I feel like I have to look good all the time — at school, at parties, at the mall, whenever I am socializing out of the house. I want people to say, ‘She looks great.’ I’m not happy if I don’t think I look good.”
Trying on 10 outfits and staring critically at the mirror before leaving the house is practically a teenage rite of passage. But these days, girls know precisely how their peers are judging them, thanks to the “Like” button on Facebook. “When I choose my profile picture, I want people to ‘Like,’ it,” said Grace. In fact, she and her friends are keenly aware of how to goose the numbers. “You get more ‘Likes’ if it’s a model shot and not a goofy picture with your friends,” she explained.
The formula is simple: The more “Likes” you get, the more popular you appear. “Girls don’t just want to get ‘Likes’ from their close friends,” said 14-year-old Lily. “They want to get them from boys, or older kids or kids from other schools who are popular.”
One way to be popular is to be sexy. The group I spoke with could all point to teenagers whose Facebook pictures are, in their words, “hot” — and also those that have crossed the line into “slutty.” Several admitted to considering posing in a bikini for their profile picture, though they were concerned about getting “a reputation,” and none have actually done so, at least not yet. “If you want a boy to look at you, you do a bikini shot or push your boobs out,” said one of the girls.
Perhaps none of this is shocking in a culture like ours. And at least one parent expressed to me that when she worries about all the things her teenager could be doing — drugs, drinking, sex — a little dress-up on Facebook seems rather benign.
But experts say there’s reason for concern. “The sexualization of girls at this age is very dangerous,” said Robyn Silverman, a child and teen development specialist. “It makes girls feel hurried. … And feeling hurried can cause anxiety, depression.”
More generally, the preoccupation with “How do I look?” may well be getting in the way of living authentically. “They are looking outward in at themselves — constantly thinking of the mirror,” said Dr. Silverman, “rather than being fully engaged in the conversation, the activity or the learning.”
As parents, that’s something we shouldn’t “Like” one bit.
Randye Hoder is a Los Angeles-based freelance writer.
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