May 12, 2013
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» Why is Gossip Girl so Thinspiring?
Why is Gossip Girl so Thinspiring?
I know I JUST posted the Blake Lively thinspiration and Taylor Momsen pix but this is going to be a text post. I want to really tear apart what gets to me about Gossip Girl and makes it such an inspiration toward working for a better life.
#1 the characters are rich/famous through no actual effort on their part.
This is huge, and I think a lot of girls will agree that it's one of the central themes to the clusterfuck that is modern media. If you are pretty, things just are handed to you. People like you, or at least forgive you for all the crazy egregious shit you do. I mean, look at Blair and Serena. In normal life, people would have stopped hanging out with them ages ago. They start shit and don't take responsibility for themselves whatsoever. But since they are rich and pretty, they get free pass after free pass. This doesn't happen in real life, even for pretty people. And if it does, it's because the person is constantly drifting from group to group as they use up their "free passes" with each one. But the fact remains that, if you're pretty and skinny, you get at least 1 free pass where people will let you do whatever. After they see the drama you bring down with that pass, they may not give another one, but the normal folk don't even get a first.
This is demonstrated as Serena gets handed job after job during the "I don't feel like going to college" season. A huge part of the drive to be skinny is the fact that, every day, we are painted the picture of skinny girls getting real life advancement with just a smile and a wish. Through the show they specifically (purposefully) never show her actually doing anything in high school. She never attends a club meeting and any membership in social societies is just defacto due to her parentage and social status. She attends the parties but doesn't plan them, basically. That's what makes Serena thinspiration so captivating. Everything is based on her looks. If she were an ugly debutante- like the girl Eric uses in the debutante ball episode- there wouldn't be a show about her. That poor girl was probably as rich as Serena- but she wasn't skinny enough, pretty enough, didn't laugh right, didn't charm the room. Blair comments on it too, though her neuroses are better fleshed out in the Gossip Girl books than on screen- where she merely comes off conniving and shallow.
The final blow here is that ANYONE can enter this world just by being pretty enough. This is shown as Nate or Dan pick up girl after girl from the streets just because she's the skinniest girl in the room. Then she basks in the limelight until inevitably it turns out she's some long-lost cousin or imposter or hireling of a competitor- the list goes on and on. But basically, being pretty is good enough reason to get picked up. You have to actually do something insane to be bumped off the show again. And if you're pretty enough- like Serena's not-cousin, you could make a multi-season arc out of it, raking in social invites and cash.
Best example of that is actually Jenny. She social-climbs higher and higher with each season, and even when she's "down" she's not out. Jenny's beautiful tresses and lovely face keep her in the upper stratosphere despite only having a tenuous connection to it. Her "lowest" point is when she is working for a major fashion label as an intern. I mean, come on.
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