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Say what you will about prom, but high schooler Skyler Branch just made the coolest fashion statement in an homage to inspiring women like Michelle Obama, Maya Angelou, and her mom. No crown necessary when she’s got all the queens on her gown. Make your day extra majestic, and keep scrolling for more news.
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Meet today's Clover, @maevemdolan: When she's not protesting, this Austin activist can be found soaking up the Texas sun.
Share Clover with your friends for a chance to be featured.
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👯 You share a lot with your friends, and we’re not just talking about lipgloss and homework. According to a fascinating new study, you and your friends share brainwaves, too. It’s basically a scientific way of explaining what we call "chemistry." So while everyone has common interests with pals, based on this research, you share something less superficial as well. Yet another reminder that who you surround yourself with matters.
🙄 Uganda has proposed a tax on social media use, in hopes of curbing online gossip—and, OK, to raise billions for the government. The president intends to charge a small daily fee to people who use services like WhatsApp, Twitter, and Skype, because, as he explained in a letter, time spent on social media is costing the country income. This—like Malaysia’s ill-conceived plan to outlaw fake news—makes us wonder if the gov doesn’t quite get the internet. Oh, wait...
👗 Have school dress codes become too discriminatory? Ask Lizzy Martinez, who went to school without a bra because she had a bad sunburn. She wore a long-sleeved T-shirt, yet still got in big trouble. The school made her put Band-Aids on her nipples—pretty painful, tbh—and shamed her for “distracting” male classmates. After her tweet about the incident went viral, Lizzy staged a #BraCott. She’s not the only student fighting back; a group of Canadian girls have won the right to wear shorter shorts in the summer. Finally.
💻 We live in a 24/7 work culture, where everyone has a side hustle and being “on” all the time is the norm. It’s not healthy—mentally or physically. Some places, like France (and maybe soon, New York City) have placed a ban on after-hours email in hopes of combating this problem. But as expert Camille Preston argues, a new law isn’t enough to restore work-life balance. We need fewer pointless meetings, more consideration for others’ time, and to get disciplined about schedules. Until we're able to rewire our whole culture, stopping procrastination is a start.
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By Vivi Baker, 16
As a teenage girl, I'm sure you can relate to the following situation: You're at a party or social event where you don't know many people. You're talking and trying to make friends when you find yourself in a circle of boys. They're charming, they're noisy, and they're all-too-confident. They're rowdy and they're together, which inevitably brings out their egos.
So they start talking about the girls they've met and maybe dated, counting them off like they're nothing more than what they ate for breakfast. The comments start getting nasty, and suddenly you're way out of your depth and you don't know what to do or say.
Staying silent feels wrong, but speaking up seems like social suicide. It feels like such a cliche, but it also feels like this kind of thing happens constantly. In the classroom, at recess, on the bus home, among friends at the movies. I sometimes feel like I'm constantly swinging between saying too much, and not enough. This is a poem about that exact feeling.
I put on my soft voice to talk to boys at parties
and carry a nail file in my back pocket to round my sharp edges
I don’t want to give them a fright
I am afraid that they will run at the sight of me
and I will be left, lipgloss-stained
too much effort and yet somehow not enough.
So I let them hang their jackets on me
and feel their hatred slip through my clenched teeth
as they talk about numbered girls
who were too loud
too ugly
too boring
too fat
too flat
too annoying
who took up too much space for their liking
and I bite my tongue and nod along
my body swaying like a sapling bearing far too much weight
I don’t make a very good coat rack.
But you see
when you have jumped inside the bear pit
and the beasts are busy tearing apart the long-dead flesh of another
you do not offer yourself up instead as a meal to be devoured
I am too thick with cowardice and self-doubt for such a noble sacrifice
or perhaps it is just survival instinct,
some sixth sense learnt from birth
or maybe this food chain
is becoming far too familiar
either way,
I hope that next time I’ll squeeze my solo cup so hard it breaks
spit poison into the mouths of the bears
and run until my legs give out
while they’re still full from their last meal.
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We're looking for girls to write about prom!
Whether you're going to prom with your boyfriend or your girlfriend or your best friend or yourself—or not going at all!—we want to hear about it.
Want to write something about the (alleged) rite of passage?
Send us your ideas here!
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K, last thing. Liza is reading all the Lil Miquela conspiracies. Casey now has another reason to read The Female Persuasion. And we're listening to...
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