Dr. Manhattan sent me a link to an article about a study that looked at aggression in girls. I glanced at the picture, after reading the first paragraph and decided that the photograph showed a nice girl and a mean girl.

Ha! WRONG.

The study examined how women reacted differently when the same girl dressed to show off her boobs and legs vs. when she dressed more conservatively. Girls sneered at the girl in the short skirt and were nicer to the girl in jeans.

In jeans, she attracted little notice and no negative comments from the students, whose reactions were being secretly recorded during the encounter and after the woman left the room. But when she wore the other outfit, virtually all the students reacted with hostility.

They stared at her, looked her up and down, rolled their eyes and sometimes showed outright anger. One asked her in disgust, “What the [expletive] is that?”

Most of the aggression, though, happened after she left the room. Then the students laughed about her and impugned her motives. One student suggested that she dressed that way in order to have sex with a professor. Another said that her breasts “were about to pop out.”

So, basically, I made the same snap decision about the girl and the study. Shame. Turns out I’m the mean girl.

Last week, I picked up Ian from school. I was stuck in the car pick-up lane, so I watched the kids coming out of the school for ten minutes or so. Because I am immersed in boy culture, I’m more attuned to their clothing and their signals. The “sporty” boys wore dark athletic socks and oversized hoodies. The preppy kids wore Oxford shirts and faded red pants. The alternative boys wore graphic t-shirts and jeans.

I guess that the girls have different clothes and signals, too, but I’m not versed in the subtle variations of girl culture. They all looked alike to me. Because they were young, none of them were wearing the short skirt look above. They all had the same long straight hair. I don’t  remember what they were wearing.

New Jersey, and this town in particular, has very strict anti-bullying laws. My kids have been to countless “anti-bullying” assemblies over the years. A dad of a kid who committed suicide after being bullied gave a talk at Jonah’s school just a couple of weeks ago. My pet peeve about these “anti-bullying” assemblies and seminars is the limited definition of bullying. It’s either described as public ridiculing or as physical confrontation.

If they are going to teach these lessons in school (I’m not even sure if school is the right place for this), I think the message should be about being kind, inclusive, non-judgmental. I would like someone to say that conformity is boring. I think everyone could use a reminder about these lessons from time to time. Including me.