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Halsey just landed a deal for a movie based on her life—and she’s starring in it. It sounds kinda like Eminem’s biopic 8 Mile...except without all the rap battles and gang drama. So press play on her latest single while you catch up on everything else that's happening below.
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Meet today's Clover, @kiara_nirghin: This South African teen is a Global Science Fair winner, a TedX speaker, and, it should go without saying, just miiiight single-handedly save the world.
Share Clover with your friends for a chance to be featured.
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👗We always hear about how school dress codes can be sexist, but guess what: they’re racist, too. A new study found that black girls get punished more harshly for their outfits than white classmates—and this, plus other cultural insensitivities, makes it harder to learn. (Ya think?) And although this particular data involves students in D.C. schools, the findings are unfortunately relevant everywhere. Down with oppressive dress codes.
😭 Finals season = lots of stress. And *also* lots of tears. This is where University of Utah’s Nemo Miller comes in. The student installed a “cry closet” in the library—which is exactly what it sounds like—where students can take 10-minute breaks to sob it out. And while the idea has (not-so-surprisingly) gone viral, it is kinda brilliant. BYO tissues.
😲 So, a judge just ordered a reopening of DACA. Sound familiar? Maybe because this is the second time it’s happened since Trump tried to end the crucial program for children of immigrants. On top of that, this marks the third federal judge to have made the exact same ruling, only to have the president attempt to override ‘em. Will this one stick? Stay tuned.
👶 When you see “teen” and “pregnancy” in a headline, you probably brace yourself for bad news. But not this time! According to the CDC’s latest report, there’s been a steep decline in pregnancies among girls under the age of 15 in the last two decades. In fact, it hit a *record* low in 2016. So, uh, keep doing what you’re doing? Or, you know, not doing.
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By Hannah Hightman, 18
“Finsta” would’ve sounded utterly foreign to me—and presumably everyone—a few years ago. But now the word produces a strange combination of emotions and connotations. After firsthand experience with the world of finstas, I’ve concluded that they’re not the sinister “dark side of Instagram” accounts our parents (and the media) seem to assume they are.
That’s not to say that my experience with finstas has been 100% positive. Shortly after learning what the term meant from a friend, I found I was blocked from following hers. The incident hurt me more than expected. All of our mutual friends still had access to her secret gallery of mirror selfies and rants about school. The friend and I continued to be on good terms in person, and it still baffled me why I wanted the digital validation of being in the "elite" group of people who know her innermost thoughts and feelings. But then I started to get it.
It had been years since I’d had a heart-to-heart with someone in person, with *actual* words. Midnight sleepover conversations had since made way for 1am texts. An adolescence spent pouring my guts out to strangers over the internet had made emotional, deep IRL social interactions surprisingly difficult, and it seems like my entire generation is encountering the same issue. There’s nothing inherently wrong with that. I think as all of us grow up and come of age, we’ll naturally learn to extend our digital heart-to-hearts and emotional outpourings into the real world, but it does place more emphasis on digital interactions.
And that’s all finstas are—people ranting and explaining their problems to a refined audience who allegedly care about them, and want to see the gritty, silly realities of their life rather than the carefully-created, glossy photos on the rest of Instagram. You’re more likely to see crying selfies on someone’s finsta than nudes. It’s very common to use a name having no relation to your given name and a finsta profile pic of a cartoon character, so once you’re granted access to someone’s finsta, it is quite literally like seeing who is behind the mask. It’s understandable to be selective when you’re trying to figure out who can best keep your secrets.
Although my first introduction to finstas was not a good one, I reevaluated my initial reaction when the follower count on my actual Instagram (or rinsta) started to rise. I also realized that professional, important people probably wouldn’t want to see me lip syncing to “Hotline Bling.” I was happy to be connecting with so many people, but in some ways it limited the content I could post and I felt I lost some creative freedom.
So, I did something that I couldn’t bear to even imagine months before: I created a finsta. My finsta is certainly not a flattering portrait of me, but I know I can always find someone on there to commiserate with and I will always have a supportive audience for my rants.
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Mother's Day is coming, so while you're procrastinating buying a gift (our suggestion: plants are never not a win), why not write an essay about your mom?
Whether your relationship is full-on Gilmore Girls or a little more Lady Bird, we'd love to hear from you.
Hit reply on this email with your ideas/drafts/poems/odes to mommy dearest. <3
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K, last thing. Casey is digging into Glamour's new issue (and website!). Liza can't tear her eyes away from Kanye's Twitter. And we're listening to...
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