houseborgia:

glorianas:

i’ve been trying to pin point and phrase why exactly the whole ‘there’s something dangerous about the boredom of teenage girls’ trend bothers me so damn much but i think it comes down to the simple fact i think it borrows from the idea that teen girls by their very nature are manipultive and dishonest or the idea they pose some kind of threat to adults simply because they are teenage girls and imo that is way to close to the whole idea of the teen seductress trying to ruin the life of the poor innocent man just for fun i mean at best it bulldozes right over how often teen girl are victimized by adults in various degrees and falls into the idea that it’s not cool or sexy to be a victim so you to be the predator which is Fucked Up

except it isn’t about this at all and you have completely misunderstood the trope, which is ok, but please don’t condemn other people for using it. the quote ‘there’s something dangerous about the boredom of teenage girls’ comes from ‘dare me’ by megan abbott, and it has since been used to reference the shared experience of many teenage girls. coming of age in a society that both hyper-sexualises young girls but prohibits them from exploring their sexuality without shame. it’s about society’s treatment of teenage girls and how it can make them hard, manipulative, cruel or any number of things, as it is the only way to regain power in the fight for autonomy. the way society shapes girls can often be dangerous, but there are infinite possibilities for how these girls act or what they become, as the trope allows girls to be seen as more than soft and sweet perfect things. it allows girls to have flaws and complexities that society wants to overlook. no one who uses the trope thinks it’s “cool or sexy to be the victim” - it’s that maybe we should stop looking at these complex characters and seeing only what men have done to them and realise that they are their own person too. because if we don’t, we contribute to society’s stripping of female power and the struggle for self-governance. not all teenage girls fit the trope as there is nothing inherently dangerous about adolescent girls, it’s just one experience of living in our society that is shared by many.

i understand that the trope can be twisted the wrong way if people aren’t familiar with it’s source or application, but it has never implied that girls have a manipulative or troubled nature but instead shows the effects of society suffocating girls with it’s expectations and constraints.