Episode 005: On Podcasts, We Wear Pink—Mean Girls (2004) with Olivia Aspiras

Join Alex and Olivia Aspiras in discussion of the psychological concepts in Tina Fey’s masterpiece Mean Girls (2004), starring Lindsay Lohan, Tina Fey, Rachel McAdams (Amy Adams), and Amanda Seyfried in her first film role. The limit does not exist on the amount of social psychology we can discuss. We thank you for being so obsessed with us!

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Legal stuff:
1. All film clips are used under Section 107 of Title 17 U.S.C. (fair use; no copyright infringement is intended).
2. Intro and outro music by Sro (“Self-Driving”). Used under license CC BY-SA 4.0.
3. Music bed tracks provided by Fool Boy Media (“New York Jazz Loop”; CC BY-NC 3.0) and Shake That Little Foot (“Bonaparte’s Retreat”; CC BY-NC-SA 3.0).

Episode Transcription

ALEX SWAN: Oh my God, you guys, this episode is going to be so fetch!

REGINA GEORGE: Stop trying to make fetch happen! It’s not going to happen.

ALEX: Ooof. How rude.

ALEX: Welcome everybody to the CinemaPsych Podcast! The podcast where psychology meets film. I’m your host, Dr. Alex Swan. I’m trying a new format for the show–this episode–I hope you like it! As you might have heard, today’s show is on the classic comedy Mean Girls. There’s plenty of psychology and some silliness to come. Now before we meet our guest host and discuss the film. I have some bit of news. You know it’s always awkward to ask for contributions and donations, but I would love to keep making this podcast. So to that end, I’ve created two places that will accept any help that you can give. On our website, cinemapsychpod.swanpsych..com, you can find links to our Patreon account, patreon.com/cinemapsychpod, or a simple PayPal link on the sidebar. Paypal.me/cinemapsychpod. I definitely appreciate all the love. I really do! You could possibly think of it as buying me a cup of all that Millennial coffee I should be drinking… or at least everyone says I’m drinking. Also be sure to like, subscribe, follow us on social media… and please rate us! Your feedback is needed! Send us an email or message us on Facebook or Twitter. We’d love to hear from you!

ALEX: My guest host today is Olivia Aspiras. Olivia recently graduated from the University of Toledo this past summer with her Ph.D. in experimental psychology and a concentration in social psychology… Congratulations! Hooray! She’s currently in her first semester as a professor of psychology in the Health, Wellness, and Behavioral Sciences Department at Clarke University, a small liberal arts college in Dubuque, Iowa… Not too far from me, which is awesome. Also, congrats, hooray! At Clarke, she teaches a variety of courses including social psychology–pretty good for our discussion toda– research methods, and positive psychology. Olivia, welcome to the program!

OLIVIA ASPIRAS: Thank you. I’m so excited to be here and talk about one of my favorite movies.

ALEX: I am super happy to have you on. To get us started on your background that relates to Mean Girls–I think it relates to Mean Girls after reading it. Could you tell us a little bit about your research and what has it focused on recently?

OLIVIA Yeah, so my research is at the intersection of social cognition and health. I’m specifically interested in how comparison processes, such as comparisons with other people, or with different versions of ourselves… how that influences our health behaviors, and if we can kind of harness these effects to try to promote healthier decisions and behaviors. I’m also interested in how we can apply social psychology to create interventions in vulnerable populations. So recently, I’ve been doing some work with criminal offenders, trying to promote health and treatment-related outcomes.

ALEX: That’s really excellent. Those are much-needed, especially that last part. I think we could extend your research–different versions of the self to our main character of-of Cady, could we not?

OLIVIA: Yeah, definitely.

ALEX: Yeah… Ok. So, thanks for talking about your research, but of course, this is a film podcast, so let’s pivot to film. I have a couple of questions just like I asked all my other guest hosts. What do you love about film?

OLIVIA: So my favorite thing about film–this is going to sound kind of cliché–but is just being able to apply everything I know about psychology when I’m watching films. I like to kind of analyze the characters and why people are doing what they’re doing. So it’s kind of both an escape from, you know, work, everyday life, but still a way to apply my biggest passion–psychology–to that hobby.

ALEX: I think we’re pretty much aligned in that. I-I-I–and because of that I don’t-I don’t think I’d call it cliché–cuz that would that would require me to think that it’s cliché and I don’t want to. <laughs> So, you combine film and psyche and your teaching, correct?

OLIVIA: Yes.

ALEX: OK, so what-what-what’s the reason behind that? What-what is–what do you want students to take away from you using these–this different medium to discuss psychology topics?

OLIVIA: Yeah, so there are two main reasons that I use film or TV shows in my teaching. One is it just gives students this concrete example that I can talk through with them. Some of the concepts we go over in class are so abstract that having that specific example… being able to show them a clip in class or assigning a movie outside of class gives them a real example to look at and help them learn the different concepts. And then it also teaches them that, you know, as you’re learning about psychology, you can go out in the real world and start applying what you’re learning to these films that you’re watching. And so it’s kind of this lifelong learning aspect of, “take what you’re learning in the classroom and bring it to the real world with you and as you’re watching films apply these concepts to it.”

ALEX: Yeah. It’s kind of like we just said why we like film, right? We want other people to like film and look at the films through little psychology goggles like we do, right?

OLIVIA: Right, exactly.

ALEX: Ok, that’s awesome! So, I-I know we’re going to be talking about Mean Girls specifically today but I’m sure that’s not your only film. What other films do you like to use in your classes?

OLIVIA: I almost do almost exclusively use Mean Girls as my example in my social psych. I use a lot of other TV shows, so not necessarily—

ALEX: TV shows, OK.

OLIVIA: –film. But I’ve started with Intro and then now and Social Psychology, it’s Mean Girls, really. So makes this a very appropriate a movie for me to discuss with you is that I use that one, because I find that students think it’s very relatable and it has that humor aspect to it. And so then they remember it because it’s also funny. So that’s–I-I pretty much use Mean Girls the most out of all films and then a lot of TV shows.

ALEX: OK, that’s fair. So, with-with respect to Mean Girls, and I think this will become fairly clear as we go through it, cuz I will be inserting clips from the the-the movie throughout our chat here. Our students are staying the same age, we’re getting older and the film itself is getting old. The film is 15 years old and yet it has this cultural longevity to it and so even though you’re-you’re using a 15-year-old film, which in, I gotta say, in-in this fast-paced, constant media thrown at you, and streaming, and film, and podcasts, and–this one included–all over the place it’s like hard to consume it all. Fifteen years a long time. Do they still get the references?

OLIVIA: Yeah, I’ve been surprised, because I thought I was going to have to start finding more recent films that students have seen, but they have all seen it when I asked, “students, have you seen this movie?” before I first start talking about it. Almost every student raises their hand and tells me they’ve seen it and they get the references. So it’s managed to stay very relevant.

ALEX: It has. I’m-I’m very surprised and I wonder if it is–I thought last week, you know, preparing for our chat and about how the memes about it are–again, have this cultural longevity to it and especially for things like, you know, “what’s your perfect date, April 25th, not too hot, not too cold, all you need is a light jacket” and “October 3rd. Hee turned around and asked what date it was. It’s October 3rd.” Like those two–I even see my students like referencing those two dates with respect to those two movies, like and those two dates obviously happen every year, right? The-the, you know, “she doesn’t even go here!” I mean-I mean we could just do anything to Damien says, honestly. It just seems to last. And I wonder if it’s going to be one of those films, like 30 years from now even, so you know, a 45-year-old film people are still going to be talking about it. So, I think that’s really cool.

OLIVIA: Yeah. And I think part of the reason is it’s so–it’s such a simple, basic movie, I guess, that students don’t feel like there has to be a lot of like psychoanalysis going on or anything and they can just see very clearly what’s going on in terms of psychology when they’re watching the movie. I think that’s why my students really enjoy those references.

ALEX: Yeah, and little do they know there is so much psych behind it, right?

OLIVIA: Yeah.

ALEX: They’re like, “why are you–why–well I-I appreciate it, Doc that we are going to be watching this awesome film in class, but honestly, what’s the point?”

OLIVIA: Yeah.

ALEX: “Oooh, that’s the point.” OK, so… All right, very cool.

ALEX: Olivia, you have decided that we should discuss Mean Girls, as we’ve been discussing for the past several minutes now and before we get into the psych of it, I just wanted to get a little bit more about the reasoning behind why it’s so–we’ll say–endemic to your psychology classes?

OLIVIA: Yeah. It is one of my favorite movies and it has been since I first saw it years ago and so it kind of became that classic go-to film for me and then when I started teaching and I realized that I could bring in one of my favorite movies into the classroom and teach about it, that I’ve-it made me love it even more and so I was really excited to have this opportunity to be able to talk about Mean Girls one of my favorite movies in the context of, psych, my biggest passion.

ALEX: Yeah. It’s like-it’s a-it’s all the worlds are colliding.

OLIVIA: Yeah, exactly.

ALEX: So I wanted to give you the opportunity to guide this conversation. I think what you found was quite a bit more than what I found coming in with, you know, social psychologist goggles on and your research background and all of that I think gives you a great amount of authority to discuss and your notes really show that different aspects of the film and different psych techniques I pretty much only focused on–I pretty much only found one so I’ll talk about my one in a little bit… but I wanted to go ahead and give the floor to you on I think what is–and after reading your notes–what I think is the biggest psych concept that is present in this film. And so what is that?

OLIVIA: Yeah, conformity.

ALEX: Yeah, conformity.

OLIVIA: Yeah, which is changing one’s behavior–your own behavior–because of the presence of other people, whether it be there directly there in front of you or just kind of the knowledge about other people is going to change your behavior.

ALEX: Yeah, right.

OLIVIA: Yeah, so, in Mean Girls specifically there are a lot of really specific examples but kind of broadly throughout the film we see Cady’s transformation into becoming Plastic. So she comes in not really knowing anything about high school in this type of setting and so when she becomes friends with the Plastics–so, Karen, Regina, and Gretchen–we see this change in her behavior, where she’s trying to fit what they’re doing. So just at the very beginning of the movie you already see when they say “on Wednesdays we wear pink,” that she asks Damian, “do you have a pink shirt I can wear/” because right away even before she’s really become friends with them she starts conforming to their kind of standards they have their dress code that you only wear jeans or sweatpants on Friday—

GRETCHEN: And we only wear jeans or track pants on Fridays. But if you break any rules, you can’t sit with us at lunch. Well, I mean not just you, any of us.

OLIVIA: They tell her that from the very beginning and she changes her behavior, starts following that dress code right away.

GRETCHEN: We always vote before we ask anyone to eat with us. It’s because considerate of the rest of the group. I mean, you wouldn’t buy a skirt without asking your friends first if it looks good on you?

CADY: I wouldn’t?

GRETCHEN: Right. Oh, and it’s the same with guys…

ALEX: Yeah, and I think part of that is in the other side of the plot, which is Janis Ian’s plot to undo Regina’s hold on the school and and her just–I don’t know, I guess we’ll call it hatred–there’s-there’s some conformity there too, because Janis is like The Puppetmaster almost and Cady is following her commands to infiltrate the Plastics and then Cady likes being plastic, and later in the film Cady becomes the leader of the Plastics for a short amount of time, so… poor Cady is being pulled in two different directions and she’s trying to fit into both groups and it’s-I-it’s-I think it’s hard for high schoolers to fit into more than one group, right?

OLIVIA: Yeah, definitely, and especially because Cady comes in without that prior knowledge of really how to act or fit in in high school and one of the reasons people conform is not just social approval, but for these informational reasons you don’t really know what to do, so you looked at other people for how to act so she has kind of both ends here of the information not knowing what to do and wanting this social approval, wanting to fit in so she’s really, yeah, just being pulled in all these different directions trying to figure out how to behave so that she can fit in and make friends in high school.

ALEX: Yeah. It’s-it’s, and if we want to take it back to one of the more seminal studies in psychology, we can-we can talk about the Asch line experiment where, you know, it was told to the participants that, “hey you’re going to do a visual perception” but there’s these, you know, four or five other people and their choosing the wrong line out of the set of three and it gets to the participant, and the participant’s “what are you all looking at? Clearly, it’s the right answer!” But then after a few trials, they’re like, “oh, wait a minute. I’m going to conform. Yeah, no it’s-it’s—” And you can see that in the-in the re-creation. So the original study was in the 1940s but the re-creation that was done in the 1970s. And it’s clearly the 1970s–there are videos on YouTube about it. You can see that the participants like looking to his left at the other people like “what are they looking at? But I guess maybe they’re right? I guess they’re right? OK, maybe they’re right.” And it’s-it’s essentially what-what-what Cady has to do at the beginning of the film to be liked by anybody.

OLIVIA: Mmhm. And you do see that kind of hesitation there in the movie, specifically in that scene where they are all body-shaming there in front of the mirror at Regina’s house pointing out all things that are wrong with them. And she’s kind of just looking at them like—

KAREN: God, my hips are huge.

GRETCHEN: Oh please. I hate my calves.

REGINA: At least you guys can wear halters. I’ve got man shoulders.

CADY: <voiceover> I used to think there was just fat and skinny. But apparently there’s a lot of things that can be wrong on your body.

OLIVIA: Is this what I’m supposed to be doing? Kind of uncertain about it. And then she’s—

CADY: I have really bad breath in the morning…

OLIVIA: So you can kind of see that hesitation there. Not really knowing like, “am I supposed to be doing this or not?” and then conforming and going along with it.

ALEX: Yeah, and she’s so confused that, you know, that the three other girls are saying actual physical things with their bodies and she comes out with something that’s not really–I mean, it’s physical but it’s almost not a visual thing, right? It has to do with bad breath. Really the only thing that’s going to be wrong about that is going up to someone and breathing in their face, and so she’s super confused about it. Yeah, that is a great scene especially minutes prior when Amy Poehler.

OLIVIA: Yeah.

ALEX: Very cool. So, Olivia, what other aspects of conformity did you catch in the film?

OLIVIA: Yeah. So it’s not just Cady who is conforming to Regina or even just Gretchen and Karen–the other Plastics–conforming. You see kind of widespread in the school that everybody wants to be like the Plastics, so that scene where they’re trying to sabotage Regina where she’s in gym and they cut the ends of her shirt off and I think that’s going to be really embarrassing for her. She walks in the hallway and then it cuts to the next scene… everybody in the school has their shirt like that, as well.

ALEX: Yeah.

OLIVIA: So all those other people see that, they’re conforming to her behavior; they want to be like her.

ALEX: Yeah, it-it’s some of the really quick— the, I want to say, the quick writing style of Tina Fey really comes through in this one, because, yeah, cutting the-the holes in the breast part of the shirt, you would think that would be the end of Regina’s life and yet because everybody just worships Regina, they all destroy their shirts. <laughs>

OLIVIA: Yes. <laughs> Yes, which leads to another kind of related to this idea of conformity here is obedience, where everybody sees Regina as this kind of authority figure, somebody that they look up to and strongly respect, and so everybody kind of wants to follow what–not just watching her behaviors, but they do what she tells them to do. They’re going to conform in that way. So we see right at the beginning, before they’re really friends Regina tells Cady “get in loser, we’re going shopping!” and she’s just, “OK.” Goes along with it. Or we see Regina kind of bossing around Gretchen, telling her to switch sides and Regina’s kind of—

REGINA: Switch sides with Cady.

GRETCHEN: But I’m always on your left.

REGINA: Well that was when they were three of us and now the tallest go in the middle.

GRETCHEN: Well, the whole dance will be backwards. I’m always on your left.

REGINA: And right now you’re getting on my last nerve.

OLIVIA: Gretchen is kind of hesitant at first but she does it on just because she is that kind of authority figure and so she wants to obey and conform to what Regina is telling her to do.

ALEX: Because she doesn’t want to lose the social status of being like Regina’s best friend. And then you get the-the several scenes, but I think one of the more famous ones is the four-way phone call. But it’s unclear that they’re all listening at the time. I-I have to explain to my students that you know we used to have to talk to people like that. Three-way calling was a thing that didn’t exist for some period of time and then it randomly exploded and then everybody did it and then you know you can hang on the line. And they’re like, “hmm, no thanks I’ll prefer-I prefer my Snapchat. I appreciate that though.” But where, you know, Gretchen is talking to Cady, Gretchen calls Regina, Regina calls Karen, Karen then talks to Gretchen, and it’s super confusing, but Regina basically destroys all of them except for Cady, cuz she doesn’t know Cady’s anywhere on those lines. One of the things that I caught-I caught in the film and one of the things that I use Mean Girls specifically in–when I teach social psychology, which is every so often, every other year or something like that, I-I use Mean Girls specifically to discuss, you know, the distinctions between forms of aggression. Many people are familiar with physical forms of aggression. You know, being physically violent or verbally violent. Much less so the relational aspect of aggression, where-which girls and women are disproport-disproportionately users of. It’s-it’s this relational aggression is apparent throughout the entire film. The burn book—

KAREN: Oh my God I remember this.

REGINA: I haven’t looked at that in forever.

GRETCHEN: Check it out, Cady. It’s our Burn Book. It’s where we cut out pictures from the yearbook and then we wrote comments. Trang Pak is a crusty little biotch.

REGINA: Still true.

GRETCHEN: Dawn Schweitzer is a fat virgin.

REGINA: Still half-true.

KAREN: Amber D’Alessio. She made out with a hot dog.

GRETCHEN: Janis Ian–Dyke!

ALEX: I mean the-the movie is called Mean Girls, right? And-and so this form of aggression is primarily done by backstabbing, rumor-spreading, firm cliques, like the Plastics, where membership is highly controlled and you-we have, you know, we have rules associated with those cliques. And you’re essentially trying to hurt somebody with words, right? And, you know, regardless of whether those words hurt, they’re meant to hurt… in addition to possible sticks and stones, but you know sticks and stones may break my bones but yeah these words are going to hurt, too, right? But I think the biggest aspect and it’s-it’s the MacGuffin in the film is the Burn Book and Janis needs to know what is in it about her. And she just wants to take–she just wants to take Regina down and the trust exercise. Her, we’ll-we’ll call it her monologue–her evil plots-reveal–explains everything to everyone and that Cady is a double agent and trying to break everything. Oh, it’s just one big relational aggression-fest isn’t it?

OLIVIA Yeah, definitely. And you can see with that, the trust exercise at the end, that those words do really hurt. Every time somebody is apologizing and they’re trying to reconcile these issues it’s all about things they said about each other. It’s not really anything that anybody really physically did to each other, it’s just, you know, “I called you this name or I said this about you,” and so you can see the impact that these harmful words can have.

ALEX: Yeah, I would say that, you know, hostile and violent aggression notwithstanding,–because it’s, you know, it’s infinitely more harmful–but relational aggression is really harmful to people’s self-esteem, to their body Images, to their worth-their self worth. Words are very harmful and how you use them. They’re like daggers. It’s almost as bad as physical aggression. I don’t want to go to that level, but it’s almost as bad, and sometimes can be worse if it’s life-ruining, you know? If it’s-if we’re talking about adults doing it to destroy or harm somebody without actually touching them, right?

OLIVIA: Yeah, exactly.

ALEX: And-and, you know, related to your-to your-your research, you’re-you’re trying to assist prison populations, right?

OLIVIA: Yes.

ALEX: And so a lot of this is done and has been done to these individuals. I just thought that was interesting when I read your-your-your little research thing–oh my gosh, no wonder, she loves this movie so much! <laughs>

OLIVIA: <laughs> Yeah that’s one of the–

ALEX: It sort of dictated everything about your psychological life.

OLIVIA: Yeah, and that’s something like when doing our work with criminal offenders who are incarcerated, we’re trying to boost kind of those positive feelings. We’ve done some self-affirmation with them and we’ve had to keep in mind knowing that these people do have a lot of aggression that they’ve experienced in their life and that this can lead to anger and sadness and things like that, and something we’re having to be conscious of when developing our interventions to work with that population.

ALEX: Yeah that’s-that’s awesome, considering the news that just came out of Oklahoma, and the women that were released for non-drylent–non-violent drug offenses because they changed possession to a misdemeanor and not a felony. So they got released and I think dealing with the life inside prison and getting life skills necessary to be-to do well back in real life, I’ll say… I’m struggling with the word that I want… but, to-to have the skills to move forward and get away from all of that is-is a good idea. We need to be doing that more.

OLIVIA: Yeah, definitely. The-the issue there of reentry and being able to successfully navigate the world outside of prison.

ALEX: Yeah, which leads me to my next query about the film. So this one’s for you, Olivia. Cady’s being pulled in two different directions: Plastics in one direction–actually, I’ll say three different directions–I forgot about the third one until-until I just said it. So three different directions: we’ve got the Plastics, we’ve got Janis and Damian, you know, we’ll say the outcasts of the high school, and Ms. Norbury, who wants Cady to join the Mathletes. The limit does not exist! So what is going on in Cady’s mind while all of this is going-while all this is going down the progression of the film? What can we say about the-the, we’ll just say turmoil, in-in Cady’s mind?

OLIVIA: Yeah, so Cady is experiencing what we call cognitive dissonance. So when somebody has these kind of conflicting or inconsistent thoughts/feelings/behaviors, it can create this kind of threat to your self-esteem or self-worth and have this kind of psychological discomfort associated with it. And so Cady throughout the movie just has this conflict that she’s having to deal with wanting to please what Janis wants her to do and infiltrate the Plastics, wanting Regina to like her, and great point, I hadn’t really thought about that of, you know, Mss. Norbury and kind of what her parents want her to stay that-that quote “good girl” who really cares about her school work and things like that. And so she’s just being pulled in all these different directions, behaving at all these different in consistent ways and so that’s going to create this type of psychological discomfort for her.

ALEX: Yeah, and the-the–it’s-it’s not pleasant for her, right? She’s-she doesn’t know which Cady to be.

OLIVIA: Yeah, so when people experience this psychological discomfort, this kind of cognitive dissonance, they have to try to deal with it in some way. You can’t just ignore it. And so the way we see Cady do that in Mean Girls is through this external justification. So it’s basically explaining or giving a reason for why you’re behaving in this conflicting way that’s outside of the self. So she specifically using the excuse of Plastic sabotage, where “oh, I’m-I’m hanging out with Regina here, it’s not–even though she’s kind of mean, and isn’t necessarily good friend to me… I’m still going to hang out with her, and that’s because it’s for Plastic sabotage.” And so she uses that as a way to kind of feel better about why she’s doing something that isn’t consistent with what other people want her to be doing, or what she personally thinks she should be doing.

ALEX: And in the end, right, she ends up joining the Mathletes to be what Ms. Norbury and her parents want her to be, which is, I guess, in direct defiance of both the Plastics and Janis, right? She’s just like, “I ruined both, and so this is-this is my last fall back.”

OLIVIA: Yeah, and I think of that joining the Mathletes is truer to who she really is and so that’s reducing that cognitive dissonance. She’s changing her actual behavior where she’s no longer just trying to appease Janis and trying to get Regina’s approval. Now she’s changing her behavior to do what she really thinks deep down she wants to do or she should be doing, and that’s going to be a way to get rid of those conflicting feelings that she has.

ALEX: And I have a-have a semi-related question to you. Have you seen the sequel? Mean Girls 2?

OLIVIA: I have not.

ALEX: Yeah, OK. Neither have I! I think it was direct-to-video. But it has to do with younger sisters, I think. I’m pretty sure. If I’m wrong, I don’t really care, because I think it was universally hated. But I think that it’s trying to be a continuation of this struggle that Cady had, but of course, that-it’s fixed at the end of the film. Cady realizes who she wants to be. Her attitudes are now in line with her behavior. There’s not much left to do, right?

OLIVIA: Yeah. I would agree with that-that everything is resolved. It ends nicely, where she’s no longer feeling conflicting and we see the Plastics kind of find their groups to fit in where they don’t have to behave in such a mean way. So yeah, I-I don’t really see there being a need for Mean Girls 2.

ALEX: Right. <laughs> I don’t think it was written by Tina Fey, I’ll tell you that. But-but yeah, it’s a nice-nice bow and the end of the film. So, you know, it’s a-it’s a parable.

OLIVIA: Yeah.

ALEX: About how not to act in high school, I suppose.

OLIVIA: Yeah.

ALEX: Right? And–but, being in 2004, and steeped within that time period, I think it fits well, but it’s also a vehicle for what other major psychological concept, Olivia?

OLIVIA: Yeah, so we see stereotyping throughout this movie. Starts off right away with that stereotype of homeschooled kids are freaks, is what Cady says.

CADY: Regina stop!

REGINA: <Screams> Do you know what everyone says about you? They say that you’re a homeschooled jungle freak who is a less hot version of me. Yeah! So don’t try to act so innocent. You can take that fake apology and shove it right up–

OLIVIA: Cuts to them and it shows kind of like stereotypical like a really smart student in a spelling bee, and then a-a student who’s talking about guns and so that’s kind of like alluding to the fact that we have the certain stereotypes–these generalizations that we attribute to all home-schooled kids, even though that’s not true.

ALEX: Yeah, <laughs> homeschooled…the homeschooled–I don’t think it would play very well. I-it’s probably one of the more, I want to say,8 most insensitive jokes in the whole film and it occurs in like the first several minutes. Especially the-the family of super religious kids…

OLIVIA: Yeah.

ALEX: I watched that again and I was like, “oh boy! Oh boy!”

OLIVIA: I thought about–I was hesitant to even mention stereotypes because I think that that’s the most offensive part of the movie.

ALEX: And they’re not-not even actual main characters, they’re just a bit. It’s just a bit. But 15 years later, oh boy, we can’t be making those jokes. We can’t be making those jokes. But I think–I’m glad you-you kept with the stereotypes, because I think it’s really worth it–I think it’s really worth it, because high school is I think is where we learn all of these stereotypes types. These cultural ideas about who’s who and what’s what and all of these things. Eh, I think high school is like the proving ground for stereotypes. So, it’s important that we-we still have-we still have this discussion, because there are stereotypes in the film.

OLIVIA: Yeah, and we see that when they are talking about the different tables where everybody sits. So the jocks sit somewhere or the-the burnouts as they referred to, and they kind of flash around to all the different tables, and you can see the people behaving kind of in a way that you would-you would associate with that stereotype. Like the jocks are kind of like wrestling each other a little bit, like on the table, and so it’s a great example of these. There’re so many different groups in high schools and how they all have these kind of stereotypical images associated with them.

ALEX: Yeah and they said-they’re all behaving in the way that they are portrayed to be, stereotypical, and then they also are dressed and appear to be in that stereotyped space, too. Which is a nice little visual cue, cuz–I forget who–is it-is it Regina or Gretchen who is describing all of them as they go around the lunchroom?

OLIVIA: I think it’s actually Janis where she—

ALEX: Oh it’s Janis. OK—

OLIVIA: Yeah.

ALEX: Cuz I–They do a little bit in the–when Cady is first meeting the-the Plastics.

OLIVIA: Yeah.

ALEX: But, yeah. Janis describing–yeah, that makes sense! It’s also seen through the eyes of Janis, which I think is important, because she’s kind of portrayed as somebody who hates everything, right?

OLIVIA: Yeah.

ALEX: She’s going through her emo/goth phase. Again, stereotypes.

OLIVIA: Yes!

ALEX: But, you know, My Chemical Romance is getting back together, so everybody’s happy about that.

OLIVIA: <laughs> Yeah. <sarcastically> Exciting news!

ALEX: <laughs> Exactly! Janis Ian would be pleased.

OLIVIA: Yes.

ALEX: But there’s the–also the-the social implications of Cady’s trying to fit in with all these different groups, right, and-and its explain to her how?

OLIVIA: Yeah, so they tell her–so, in terms of joining the Mathletes, multiple characters, Damian and Regina both tell her you can’t do that it’s social suicide and so it’s kind of has this implication there of, “you’re not going to be cool, you’re going to be lower on that social ladder there in the school if you join the Mathletes.”

ALEX: Yeah and be associated with Kevin.

OLIVIA: Yes.

ALEX: Oh God. Kevin. But–a-a-and, in hindsight for me specifically, who’s always been a geeky kid and anerdy kid, that–I-I mean if that was the line that is drawn in the sand, then I had social suicide when I was in like, I don’t know, second grade. Because, and-and if that’s how we’re drawing–if that’s how we’re drawing social status, then I was always on the bottom. But I’m not–people shouldn’t feel sorry for me, that’s fine. I’m here. I’m doing great, so, you know don’t feel sorry for me, because we should actually buy into that argument that just joining the Mathletes is social suicide. Why–people should be they want to be, who they should be, and who they feel like is necessary to be, and we shouldn’t tell them that they’re any less of a person who belongs because they wanted to do that.

OLIVIA: Yeah, exactly.

ALEX: But Kevin is kind of the worst.

OLIVIA: <laughs> Yeah, he is. <laughs>

ALEX: And so, the-the other one, and I wanted to save this to the very end, because bless her heart, what’s wrong with Karen?

OLIVIA: <laughs> Yeah, so when she first meets Cady and Cady says she’s just moved here from Africa. “You’re from Africa, why are you white?” So she has this stereotype that if you’re from Africa you can only look a certain way–that you can’t be white if you’re from Africa.

ALEX: <laughs> I-I rewatched that, and I had totally-I had forgotten about it and I had forgotten about it. I mean, I knew Karen was dumb, and played brilliantly by…oh, I’m blanking on her name now. Help me!

OLIVIA: Amanda Seyfried?

ALEX: Yeah, Amanda Seyfried! There we go–thank you! Played brilliantly… just like, almost–it’s perfect–

OLIVIA: It really is!

ALEX: –how good it is. Perfect how good it is. That I-I just–I had forgotten about that and I was completely floored by it. What? What? <laughs>

OLIVIA: I mean, I think that’s one of those classic lines that’s kind of become a meme that has helped this movie live on is that specific line there.

ALEX: Yeah, I think you’re right about that. I think you’re right about that.

CADY: <voiceover> And that’s how Regina George died. No I’m totally kidding. But she did get hurt. Some girls say they saw her head go all the way around. But that’s just a rumor. Some people swear they saw me push her in front of the bus. That wasn’t even worse rumor.

ALEX: I mean, what-what happened to Lindsay Lohan? She was doing so great. SHe was fantastic in the movie.

OLIVIA: Yeah, it just went all down hill, I think pretty quickly after that.

ALEX: Yeah, I think–yeah. She did like Herrbie maybe afterward–Herbie Fully Loaded. Yeah, poor thing. Other bit of trivia, and I’m making this completely up: Amy Adams was–not Amy Adams–Rachel McAdams <laughs> was actually hit by the bus… whaaaat?

OLIVIA: <laughs>

ALEX: No, that’s completely false.

OLIVIA: Cady actually pushed her.

ALEX: Yes <laughs> yes, Lindsay Lohan hated her so much, actually pushed her and Amanda Seyfried, or Saifred, or SiFried, I don’t know, is actually that dumb.

OLIVIA: <laughs> That would be shocking if she has gotten this far in her careeri if she was that dumb. <laughs>

ALEX: <laughs> Yeah, no… all of that trivia was completely made up because who needs trivia when you have a memes…you go, Glenn Coco!

OLIVIA: Yes.

ALEX: What are your favorite lines?

OLIVIA: The “it’s October 3rd” is, even though it’s just so basic. When it is October 3rd, I am so happy. Actually had a student who came up to me after class–I had social psych on October 3rd–and said “I tried to come to the classroom early to write ‘it’s October 3rd’ on the board for you, but the classroom was locked!” So–

ALEX: Aww, that’s a bummer.

OLIVIA: I know!

ALEX: You know, we did miss out on a perfect opportunity to record this episode on October 3rd.

OLIVIA: Yeah.

ALEX: We could say that we did record it on October 3rd, but I think that would be a bit disingenuous.

OLIVIA: Yeah.

ALEX: <laughs>

OLIVIA: <laughs> That is a great missed opportunity.

ALEX: Yeah, and I didn’t really want to put it off all the way to April 25th, honestly. A bit of trivia, my cousin’s birthday is on April 25th; it’s the perfect date.

OLIVIA: Yeah. That’s awesome.

ALEX: My son was born two days prior to the perfect date, so we can say that it was perfect-ish.

OLIVIA: Yeah, close enough.

ALEX: The perfect-ish date. Maybe it’s a little too cold, I don’t know. You know, it’s a bit of a-it’s a bit of a bummer. But, you know, it’s-it’s such a fun movie, it really is such a fun movie and all of the memes can just live on forever for all I care–

OLIVIA: Yeah.

ALEX: –because they’re fantastic. There should be–I saw-I was watching the-the-the scene last week of Tina Fey, right after the Burn Book, and-and they cut to the mall and Tina Fey as Ms Norbury was saying that she was taking her boyfriend out and she points over to, like a homeless looking, guy.

DAMIAN: Shopping?

NORBURY: No, no I’m just here with my boyfriend. <awkward silence as she points to a person elsewhere> Joking! Sometimes older people make jokes.

DAMIAN: My nana takes her wig off when she’s drunk.

NORBURY: Your nana and I have that in common. No, actually, I’m just here cuz I bartend a couple nights a week down at PJ Calamity’s. Cady, I hope you do join Mathletes, cuz you know, we start a couple weeks and I would love to have a girl on the team. Just, you know, so the team could meet a girl.

CADY: I think I’m going to do it.

NORBURY: Great!

DAMIAN: You can’t join Mathletes, it’s social suicide!

NORBURY: Thanks, Damian. Well… this has been sufficiently awkward… and I’ll see you guys tomorrow.

ALEX: <laughs> That needs to be, that-that needs to be a meme, honestly.

OLIVIA: That is a great scene.

ALEX: Right.

OLIVIA: And I love that seeing teachers outside of school is like watching a dog–or seeing a dog walk on its hind legs, cuz I think students kind of do feel that way even as professors, even-even though–

ALEX: As adults?

OLIVIA: –they see at the lot for multiple classes that when they see us in public it’s like, “oh my gosh, they’re a person?”<laughs>

ALEX: Yeah, I-I went to homecoming recently… I went to the homecoming festivities before the game, and I just think people don’t really know how to talk to me… outside of class or outside of like, “I am professor, you are student!” You know? Yeah, and she really hits the nail on the head: “a dog walking on hind legs”. It is strange… I don’t want any part of it. And please leave. You’re making this more awkward. You’re making this worse.

OLIVIA: Yeah, exactly. <laughs>

ALEX: Olivia, I want to thank you for joining me to discuss Mean Girls. While you were saying goodbye, is there anything that you’d like to share where folks can find out more about your work? Go ahead and plug away!

OLIVIA: I actually don’t have anything to plug I’m still in the process of creating my Squarespace website and I don’t think the faculty–they’ve even had my faculty website up yet–

ALEX: Bummer!

OLIVIA: –since I literally just started a few months ago, so I unfortunately don’t have anything to plug.

ALEX: So if you’re getting your Squarespace up, do you have a URL for it?

OLIVIA: It should be–I think it’s just like the regular squarespace.com/olivia-aspiras.

ALEX: OK! I think that’s worth it because, you know, if it’s not up right now maybe if somebody listens to this later and is like, “I really like this Olivia person, I want to know more about her and her work,” then your site might be up.

OLIVIA: Yes, it should be! It’s pretty much together; it’s just at this point the proofreading–

ALEX: Excellent!

OLIVIA: –and making sure everything is perfect before I have it up there.

ALEX: Well, I really appreciate you coming-you coming by and chatting with-with me about Mean Girls. I think we share our love of this film and I think I’m an incorporate quite a bit more into what I can. The next time I teach definitely–next time I teach social psych, it-it might actually be the film I choose and not 12 Angry Men, although 12 Angry Men is pretty good, but it might be the one. And I think my students might appreciate it a little bit more. Might appreciate me a little bit more, cuz as I am I’m sure they-they do when they hear that you’re-you’re going to be talking about Mean Girls. Hey listener! Please share and subscribe to the podcast. Thank you to all the people who are sharing on social media. I can’t see all the shares but I know they’re happening and so if you do have a little bit of extra bit of help in you, if you could take a look at our Patreon or our PayPal and spare some change to keep the podcast going, we would definitely love that! Olivia, it was great to have you on.

OLIVIA: Thanks for having me!

ALEX: Definitely keep us apprised of how that website’s going and please share your work. Until the next episode thanks for listening…

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