The official student newspaper of Walter Johnson High School

The Pitch

The official student newspaper of Walter Johnson High School

The Pitch

The official student newspaper of Walter Johnson High School

The Pitch

Out of Left Field: Spotted On Network TV: Surgically Enhanced, Old-Ass, Fake Teens — xoxo Gossip Girl

A couple of nights ago, I was out on the town at one in the morning, swigging Cosmos and soaking in my own fabulousness. I made my way down Rodeo Drive (or was it Park Avenue?) surrounded by other paradoxically bright-yet-dumb, beautiful-yet-emotionally ugly and young-yet-really old people like myself. We fought, made up, did hard drugs, drank a lot and threw our inordinate amounts of cash around like candy. The following morning, I was back in school, manipulating and clawing my way through the school’s social hierarchy. Basically, it was a normal day in my life or, at least, my life according to network television.

Here in the fantastical land of scripted television series, we all live in posh penthouses on the Upper East Side or in the cavernous mansions of Beverly Hills. Even if you’re poor, you’re at least guaranteed an artsy loft in a hip area of Brooklyn. Of course, this fantastical land isn’t purely limited to the confines of television; we all live like this, right?

Don’t bother telling me I’m wrong; I know you’re just being modest. According to network television, the average teen is gorgeous, physically older than their actual age, a total bitch and the proud recipient of a large trust fund. If the big television networks are saying it, it must be true.

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So, regardless of whether these standards may put unfair stereotypes and pressures upon adolescents, who may feel compelled to strive towards these unfair demands, we continue to eat up this fake, manufactured, polished world. Don’t get me wrong, I love “Gossip Girl” and “The Hills,” but what ever happened to the average teen featured on television? The teen archetypes of countless shows such as “The Cosby Show” or even “The Brady Bunch” have been virtually non-existent since the creation of “Beverly Hills, 90210” and the army of shows centering around self-obsessed, financially well-endowed and good-looking teens who followed. Maybe in some regards it is perfectly fine to dive into a fanciful world every now and then, but when it spells the end for the modern, average American teen on television, there’s a serious problem.

This is not an attack on these programs purely for their portrayal of teenagers, but more for the fact that they detract from how real teenagers are presented on the small screen. It’s healthy to watch ordinary teens figuring out their life problems, but throwing in extraneous variables like wealth and beauty may push people our age to strive towards this unrealistic goal. A popular show focusing on real teens facing real problems would be a refreshing take on the genre, if not for entertainment purposes only but also to make us feel comfortable in our real selves.

So I’ll continue to live in my fake world, where I’m exorbitantly wealthy, perfect in figure, and fully matured beyond my own years while you can all petition these networks and plead for some realism for once. We can still indulge in a little worship of the rich and fabulous fictional characters of, say, “90210” once in a while but a small dose of authenticity every now and then can do you a world of good. If you don’t know where to start, I suggest you turn to BBC America’s fantastic series “Skins,” profiled by The Pitch’s Kate Duffy in this issue.

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