Nina Haug
Richardson, TX

While applying for college, I realized that I have no “hook” – the box, story, or line that might make me more than just another high-achieving middle class white girl applying to too many schools. And I had absolutely no right to complain about this – I grew up in a minimally dysfunctional family with a nice home and a nice school. But there’s an assumption that this state of middle class white femaleness equals a lack of problems. It’s a nice assumption. And it even fits with so many stereotypes of suburban girls. Maybe we can be pushy, maybe we can be annoying, but come on – real problems? Never.

The thing is, it’s not true. Middle class, high-achieving, teenage and college-age girls (regardless of race) are those most likely to suffer from eating disorders and self-mutilation. I’d say that indicates real problems. The stress and pressure on middle-class high-achieving girls to BE so perfectly put-together and without flaws really leads to serious problems with self-image and then self-harm.

I’ll admit that these issues do cross racial, ethnic, class, and gender lines. But for me, there seems to be a general assumption on the part of those I know that girls who dress nicely, are well-behaved, and are ethnically or racially “bland” cannot have real problems. And any indicators of problems, of stress, of pressure, are dismissed as the whining of privileged girls who don’t have the “real” problems of the antisocial disorders of our male.peers, of racial or ethnic discrimination, of oppressive poverty. Who are simply “poor little middle class white girls.”