Monday, July 9, 2012

Well, This Has Been Sufficiently Awkward

I know, I know. Isn't that Mean Girls quote already the name of this entire blog? Yes. Yes it is. I suppose if this blog were a compact disc, this post would be the title track.

You see, I have a problem with the way awkward people are portrayed on television. I know what you're thinking. TV isn't an accurate reflection of reality?! Shut up! But this is more upsetting than 30-year-olds playing high school students, or the fact that there are only 12 desks in a classroom on Pretty Little Liars. This is about a travesty that's been inflicted on MY OWN PEOPLE.

I recently read in either Glamour or GL (Lucy Hale was on the cover!) that awkward TV characters are super hot right now thanks to shows like HBO's Girls and, of course, MTV's Awkward. Several people have told me that I need to watch Girls because it's about young, awkward, broke twenty somethings, so I'm obviously their target audience. But I want to know how on earth they think their target audience could afford HBO. So, I haven't seen the show, but from the (free) clips I've watched, those girls seem like the hippest of hipsters and would probably shun the crap out of me. On Awkward, the main character, Jenna, has spent the series having two guys fight over her. That's not something awkward types typically experience, based on all of the real-life awkward people I know.

Even looking back at past TV shows, awkward people have never been portrayed correctly. On The O.C., we had another case of the Horrendously Unrealistic Love Triangle when the allegedly socially awkward Seth Cohen had two girls fighting over him - despite the fact that he spent his free time playing with a plastic horse named Captain Oats. Then on '90s sitcoms, you either had to be a Screech or a Zack; there was nothing in between. Those who weren't nerdy enough to be a nerd and not cool enough to be cool didn't really have a place.

Maybe these inaccurate depictions of awkward people are intended to give real awkward people hope; they, too, can be ΓΌber hip or constantly in the middle of a love triangle (although neither of these sound very fun to me). If Jenna can get two boys to fall in love with her, so can you, awkward 16-year-old! If Chuck (from the underwatched show Chuck) can accidentally become a spy, you can, too, nerdy twenty-something retail slave! If Harry Potter can...you get the point.

All of this probably just proves that I'm jealous of these fictional characters' exciting lives. Or I'm just sad about the fact that it's adorable when a TV character plays with a plastic horse, but it would be frowned upon in the real world. I've seen the frowns! I know it's true! And that explains why most of my formerly awkward friends have moved on to cooler pastures (like clubs, I think). For them, awkwardness was not a lifestyle, but merely a phase.

Okay, I'm sick of talking about awkwardness. "Awkward" is really only a word people throw around to justify their crappy social skills. "Oh my god, I am sooooo awkward." Let's just avoid shows about awkward people altogether! Actually, lately I've preferred shows about fabulous people with problems (most recently watched shows on Netflix: Pretty Little Liars and Laguna Beach). At least the characters on these shows are supposed to be socially superior, so I don't feel the need to constantly compare myself to them. I can just admire their pretty clothes.