Tiffany Raiford
Mean girls are the worst. And I know this because I was one. I wasnât quite Regina George from âMean Girls,â or even Kady, Lindsay Lohanâs character from the same movie, but I wasnât nice. I was a teenage girl at her worst, and I look back on that time with serious regret. I never picked fights with people, or blatantly called people names to their faces â that I really remember, anyway â and I never treated people the way that the real mean girls in my school treated others. But believe me that I was friends with the mean girls, and I laughed alongside them as they did mistreat people to their faces.
I still know a few of them today thanks in large part to social media, and they have not changed. They are insulting, rude and not very nice. The good news, at least in my opinion, is that karma seems to have gotten them. Not one of them seems to be doing anything noteworthy or worthwhile in their lives and they seem to be stuck at the bottom making no effort to better themselves. Itâs as if they peaked in high school and never made it anywhere else in life. Petty, yes; but sometimes I remember the way that they behaved in school and I think that they deserve everything that theyâve been handed in life because of their negative attitudes and their rude personalities.
On that note, I am absolutely ashamed of myself. I am horrified that I was ever a party to that kind of behavior. I wasnât the one being rude to peopleâs faces and making them hate their lives, but I watched it, laughed and let it happen. That makes me feel very small, very ashamed and very unhappy. I canât change the past, unfortunately. But I can change the future, and I made that decision a long time ago. As I grew up, I learned very quickly that I needed to form my own confidence and not worry about offending others for not agreeing with them. Itâs made my adulthood that much better. And itâs taught me that I have to teach my own daughters differently.
I donât want them to behave as I did. I donât want them to be weak, but I also donât want them to grow up and assert their strength with cruelty and malice. For that, Iâve decided to draft a small open letter to the mean girls in high school â myself included.
Dear Mean Girls,
I get it. I see what youâre doing. Youâre insecure. Perhaps you donât come from a great family. Perhaps you hate yourself. Perhaps you are living a miserable life with families that arenât supportive and you have no structure and no boundaries. Perhaps you have little self-esteem and confidence, and thatâs why you stand here and you make fun of the way people look. Perhaps thatâs what makes you feel good.
Perhaps you stand by and watch your âfriendsâ â who we both know will turn on you in an instant â make fun of others and treat them poorly because you donât have the courage to stand up for others. Perhaps you are weak and you are afraid that you will be their next target. I get it â I do. But these girls â you girls â you donât matter. And while your attitudes might make you feel as if you are better than people today, thatâs how it works. Look to your right; those girls standing there next to you, theyâre not standing there out of loyalty and friendship and love; theyâre standing there because they are too afraid of you to walk away.
One day, you will go off to college and those girls will never call you again. You will never see them again because this is their chance to break free of you. This is their chance to get out from under your scary wings and become people that they like and respect. Your friends arenât your friends because they want to be your friends; they are your friends because they are too afraid not to be your friends.
Mean girls, you can do better than this. Do you really feel good making people feel poorly about themselves? Have you ever tried helping someone, or doing something nice for someone who really does appreciate your actions? Do you know how good that feels? Thatâs what real happiness and real power feels like; it feels like being able to give back to those in need. Real power is not taking from people something that they probably have very little of in the first place; itâs giving them something that they might not find otherwise.
When you grow up, your personality is not going to get you very far in life. People, adults, recognize a mean girl. They recognize entitlement, they recognize attitude and they recognize your lack of self-confidence and your sadness. And guess what: They donât want to take that on. Most people donât want that in their lives.
Sure, you might think that making fun of someoneâs weight or hair or the fact that she canât afford designer clothes is funny â itâs not. Think about the Heidi Klumâs and the Julia Robertsâ of the world, who were made fun of for being funny looking or different growing up. Look at them now. Theyâre more successful that most anyone, and thatâs because they were able to overcome the words of the mean girls they grew up with.
The person that you are right now; itâs not a good person. The person that you are right now has no real friends. The person that you are right now needs to change. You need to give back, be kind and be the kind of person people want to see coming down the hall instead of the one that they dread seeing. You know that old saying that everyone brings happiness into the lives of others, some when they come and many when they go?
Be the person that brings happiness when you arrive, not when you leave. Your legacy; thatâs what thatâs all about.
PS â I want to add something. When my husband and I attended my 10th high school reunion a few years ago, I was nervous to see many people. It was almost five years ago. I was scared. I thought maybe people would not be very nice to me since I wasnât very nice to them. Fortunately, most people seemed to have grown up â myself included. However, when I excused myself to go to the ladies room, my husband was approached by a man I donât remember. He asked my husband if he was married to me, and proceeded to tell him that heâs successful and very happy now, even though I once told him that he was a nobody, not important.
It took my husband a few days to tell me this story, because he wasnât sure it was appropriate. The person in question lives in another country now, so itâs not really affecting me in the least. It turns out, I have no recollection of this boy from school at all. His name doesnât ring a bell with me in the least. For that, I was so ashamed. I think about that often; the fact that I would ever say something so horrible to someone else â it wasnât nice. I am deeply apologetic, and I wish my husband would have said something to me that night so that I could have sought out this individual and apologize. My husband knew I would want to do this, and he said that he felt this man was just so angry he didnât want me near him â and thatâs why he chose not to tell me.
Regardless, I am so ashamed of my actions â my words. What I take from that is that kids are mean, and I am burdened by that. I never want my kids to behave in this manner, and Iâve made a huge effort to be kinder, more tolerant and much nicer ever since. I donât want my kids to see that and think that itâs all right. I have a small bit of knowledge that at least my actions back then have changed me today and that I can make a difference now, even if I was horrible then.
Photo by Playbuzz
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