Growing up too fast-
Is consumerism playing too big of a part in your
preteen's life?
by Linda Perlstein
PARENTGUIDE News January 2004
In the 19th century people came calling, in the 20th century
they phoned, and now preteens communi-cate on the Internet.
They type to each other as fast as 30-dollar-an-hour secretaries
(except that secretaries can spell), one instant-message
box on the screen for each conversation.
• Wus^.
• NMJC.
What’s up? Not much just chillin’. If not
much is up and they’re just chilling, you wonder
why they don’t have time to type out the words.
Parents have become familiar with the sounds of IM, the
arpeggios of acceptance twinkling every time the person
on the other end of the line has something to say.
Middle school is when most kids start to truly immerse
themselves in the worlds of communication, culture and
consumerism— the Internet is only the latest manifestation.
Fads— short-lived, by definition— have always
been a big part of being 11. But even spheres that have
always interested the preteen have become more and more
centered on them. Now the promoters of popular culture—
like CosmoGIRL!, Delia’s catalogue and ABC Family
Channel— focus to an overwhelming degree on a girl
whose every penny spent is the result of a calculated
decision about what CD or shirt or lip gloss will help
her fit in. What they watch on television, whether they
drink, what they want to be when they grow up— for
preteens, parents influence these decisions more than
any other source. But for music and clothes, the biggest
influence is friends. What agony when the girls arrange
themselves on the schoolyard according to shirt color—
purple, white, purple, white— and one girl is wearing
a black vest.
Middle-school kids no longer crib their older siblings’
culture identity— they’ve got their own—
and retailers are seizing on this like never before. It’s
partly because the preteen population is growing so fast.
It’s partly because kids, beneficiaries of a flush
economy and victims of busy-or-otherwise-guilty-thus-indulgent
parents just have so much money to blow. (One study found
that someone between the ages of 12 and 15 spends, on
average, $59 a week, about one-third on clothes, the bulk
of the rest on entertainment. And that doesn’t even
count what their parents spend on them). It’s partly
because kids are growing up faster. And it’s partly
because retailers, having saturated every small town,
every other market, simply have nowhere else to go.
This year, the small of the back is everywhere, as shirts
for girls stop short of the belly and make announcements
across the chest: “Trouble,” or “How
Hot Am I.” The jeans ride tight and low, real low,
so flowered cotton underpants— these are still children,
after all— bunch up above the belt loops. The boys
wear pants low, of course, and baggy, and the girls like
to mock the way this forces them to run, grabbing their
waistbands and bowing their legs out, almost a waddle.
The consumerism that is such a big part of young adolescence
these days is, truly, a big pain for parents, many of
whom reasonably think those pants look stupid. But they
can, and should, pay attention to the school dress code
and exercise some control at the mall, even when they
hear, “But it’s my money!” Giving in
is easier in the short run, but a kid who gets used to
hearing “no” might stop fighting it after
a while.
Insensitivity to the importance of fitting in, however,
is unforgivable. By all means, a boy in today’s
world should not be made to wear snug slacks. But he can
be denied any jeans where a basketball could pass through
the leg. A girl who wants a message to crawl across her
chest? A mother can tell her which messages are too slutty
and why, and let her choose from the others.
Middle school kids have their own sitcoms, at once treacly
and ironic, usually starring the Olson twins or some facsimile.
The music industry, too, has begun to capitalize on the
vast buying power of preteens, who used to listen to their
older siblings’ records (or even their parents’!)
but now have genres all to themselves. They are sick of
hearing their baby-boom parents brag about how great their
music was. They are sick of what they listened to last
week, and thank goodness, because, with the music-production
process sped up, there’s always something new right
around the corner.
A parent’s control is limited— nothing’s
changed on that score. An aspiring punk-rocker might be
forbidden from wearing that raggedy skull wristband, but
he will keep it in his backpack and put it on at school.
A girl whose parents ban eyeliner applies it, shakily,
on the bus. That doesn’t mean parents shouldn’t
forbid what they truly feel is untoward. They should,
however, think carefully about just how dangerous that
ratty wristband really is. Because growing up, after all,
is in large part about creating a style.
Excerpted from NOT MUCH JUST CHILLIN’: THE HIDDEN
LIVES OF MIDDLE SCHOOLERS by Linda Perlstein, published
by Farrar, Straus and Giroux, LLC. Copyright (c)2003 by
Linda Perlstein. All rights reserved.
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