Childhood? Vaping Tweens and Teens in Crop Tops, Thongs and Makeup

The kicker for "Being 13", Jessica Bennett's New York Times post (Sept. 20, 2023), serves as a good synopsis of the piece:

Three girls, one year. This is what it’s like to be 13 today, in a world that can’t stop talking about the dire state of your future.

One of the girls Bennett profiled was Anna - a 13-year-old 8th grader at a top-ranked charter school in Colorado. 

Anna reminded us of Mare of HBO's Mare of Easttown. After Mare discovered that Erin, a teen, had a secret account on Sidedoor's escort service, Mare said, "Trust me. Teenage girls are fucking sneaky."

In terms of sneaky teens, after Anna complained to her mom, via text, about being the only member of her 8th grade friend group who wasn't allowed to wear thongs and crop tops, Anna: 

"[...] went to Victoria’s Secret with her friends and bought the [thong] underwear anyway, then hid them in her room."

(In addition, Bennett shared that Anna's parents had discovered, via Anna's iPhone, that 13-year-old Anna had been sneaking to her boyfriend's house, conveniently, when his parents weren't home, which reminded me of 17-year-old Lily of HBO's And Just Like That whom lost her virginity in her boyfriend's house, conveniently, when his parents weren't home.)

In terms of tweens in crop tops, Anna’s mother may not condone it, but 11-year-old Maxwell’s mother, Jessica Simpson, condones it; however, some of Simpson’s followers condemned Maxwell’s crop top. 

Leah Bitsky reported for Page Six that “Jessica Simpson [was] slammed for letting 11-year-old daughter, Maxwell, wear crop top” (August 28, 2023)

Bitsky reported that after Simpson posted pictures on Instagram of 11-year-old Maxwell posing seductively (i.e., tongue out) in a crop top, one of Simpon’s followers posted: “Isn’t she like 11 or something?? Stop sexualizing your little girl” But Bitsky related that another follower defended Maxwell’s tween crop top by posting: “So many Karens here geez! No 11 year old looks like an 11 yr old today. We’re not in the Brady Bunch years anymore, she looks fine [...]!” 

Yet, none of Simpson’s followers addressed designers like Marc Jacobs whom designed crop tops for tweens and teens. For example, we posted that Brooke Frischer posted on Fashionista that "Heaven [by Marc Jacobs] and Bluemarine Made the High School Movie Wardrobe of Your Dreams a Reality" (JUL 7, 2023).

Per Frischer, Blumarine by Marc Jacobs features 11 of the brands best-selling pieces, which boast the brands "signature touches". The best-selling signature pieces consist of ultra-mini skirts, and they mean ultra, lacy pink camisoles, baby tees, and they mean baby, and cropped sweatshirts - among other revealing pieces. 

In terms of thongs, we wrote in our substack “From the 1939 World's Fair to TikTok: A History of Teen Thongs” that Ariel Levy wrote in Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture (Free Press, 2005) that the thong was invented in New York City to "cover" exotic dancers during the 1939 World's Fair but that thongs are no longer relegated to exotic dancers but that thongs, like Hello Kitty and Abercrombie & Fitch, have become the "underpants of choice" for nymphets:

Now they are the underpants of choice for pubescent girls. I saw Hello Kitty thongs for sale at the mall; Abercrombie & Fitch—which markets to seven- to fourteen-year-olds—makes a thong that says WINK WINK and another that declares EYE CANDY; the teen chain store Hot Topic sells a Cat in the Hat thong; Delia’s has a little cotton thong with Bart Simpson on the front and another that asks FEELING LUCKY? with a green four-leaf clover stamped on the crotch. The urban youth Web site Dr. Jay’s has rhinestone Playboy bunny thongs with matching camisoles. 

In addition, we related that there’s a plethora of dancing teens in (cheeky) thongs on TikTok; thus, it should not be surprising that Anna was the only 8th grader in her friend group who didn’t wear thongs. 

And while we’re on the topic of tweens in crop tops and thongs, it’s worth re-mentioning Rachel Brown’s post on Beauty Independent that “Evereden Is Positioning Itself To Lead The Race For Gen Alpha Consumers” (September 12, 2023) In other words, Evereden is selling makeup to 13-and-under-year-olds. And it states in the piece’s kicker that Evereden is: “[...] encouraging gen alpha consumers to play with beauty products [...]” 

EverEden: Kids

And why is Evereden selling makeup, like Ruby Red Lip Oil, to 13-year-olds? It’s for the same reason that Marc Jacobs is designing crop tops to teens and Abercrombie & Fitch was selling thongs to tweens. #money And notice that the brown tween in the Evereden advertisement (above) is dressed, à la Blumarine by Marc Jacobs, in a crop top and mini skirt.

Lastly, if adults wear crop tops, thongs and makeup, one should not be surprised to see tweens and teens in crop tops, thongs and makeup, because as Neil Postman reminded in The Disappearance of Childhood (Vintage/Random House, 1994), as recently as two hundred years ago, the concept of childhood did not exist and that it originated during the Renaissance with the invention of the printing press, which initiated a separation between children and adults with the bridge from childhood to adulthood being only crossed by learning how to read. 

In addition, Jennifer Senior related in her piece "Little Grown-ups and Their Progeny" (April 8, 2013), which was part of the New York magazine cover story "Childhood in New York", that up until the end of the WWII, children were expected to contribute to the family financially. Particular to New York City, newsboys were rampant, but delivering newspapers wasn’t their only source of income. They: “[…] blacked boots, scavenged for junk, and shuttled messages and goods.” But: “[...] child poverty, child abuse, and exploitative labor practices […]” lead to an effort by reformers and the government (e.g. Children’s Bureau) to protect children.

However, Steven Mintz, the author of Huck’s Raft: A History of Childhood in America (Belknap Press\Harvard University Press, 2006), wrote that, “They [reformers and the government] viewed kids smoking at 10 and 12 and having independent money and walking into bars as the worst thing in the world. It reminds you that "child" is a label, not a reality."

And just like Postman related in The Disappearance of Childhood, things have gone full circle. The separation that resulted from the printing press and the Children’s Bureau has been seemingly removed by smartphones and social media. Consequently, we shouldn’t be surprised to see a 13-year-old nymphet in a crop top and micro mini skirt that barely covers her thong with a vape between her Ruby Red lips.  

Evereden's Beauty Products That Won't Sexualize Tweens?

Rachel Brown posted on Beauty Independent that “Evereden Is Positioning Itself To Lead The Race For Gen Alpha Consumers” (September 12, 2023) In other words, Evereden is selling makeup to 13-and-under-year-olds. And it states in the piece’s kicker that Evereden is: “[...] encouraging gen alpha consumers to play with beauty products [...]” [Emphasis added]

And why is Evereden selling makeup to 13-year-olds? We’ll answer that with a bit of poetry from Method Man: “Cash rules everything around me, C.R.E.A.M./Get the money; dollar, dollar bill, y'all.” And the piece’s kicker added: “Evereden isn’t playing when it comes to its aspirations to win their [i.e., Gen Alpha] business for the long term.”

The makeup, which is, once again: “[...] aimed squarely at alpha’s budding beauty consumers,” was strategically named Face Crayon and Lip Oil and will be sold on Evereden’s website, on Amazon, and at Sephora. [Emphasis added]

Called Evereden At Play, the collection contains $20 Kids Fantasy Face Crayon in nine vivid shades and $16 Kids Tinted Lip Oil in two shades. The products are launching on Evereden’s website as well as Amazon and will be rolling out to select retail partners. The brand is available at 90-plus Sephora doors in 20 international markets.

Kimberley Ho, the founder and CEO of Evereden, left no doubt about her company using the allure of nymphets, in makeup, to make money. 

“Gen alpha is just getting started. The oldest gen alpha consumer is 13 years old. In a few years they’re going to be 18 years old, and their spending power is not to be underestimated.”

To be fair, Evereden isn’t prompting 13-years-olds to wear makeup. Evereden is simply providing options, because, per Evereden’s research, a whopping number of pre-teens already use cosmetic products. 

The brand tapped around 50 kids under the age of 13 to provide Evereden feedback about the colors, scents and texture of the products in its color collection. What’s clear to the brand is kids are enthusiastic about beauty—and it doesn’t anticipate that enthusiasm waning as they mature. Evereden shares estimates that 70% of children under 12 use kids’ cosmetics products, 54% of them use at least one cosmetic item per month, and 60% use kids face paint.

And per Ho, tweens on TikTok are, “[...] talking about Selena Gomez’s Rare Beauty [...] [And] [t]hey’re using their mothers’ Drunk Elephant products.”

In addition, we’ve blogged about nepo tweens in makeup. For example, we recapped Jessica Bennett’s Page Six post: "Kourtney Kardashian faces backlash after daughter Penelope, 10, shares makeup routine (August 27, 2022).

And we blogged about Riley Cardoza’s Page Six piece: “Alec Baldwin's 9-year-old daughter, Carmen, wears makeup in back-to-school photo” (September 8, 2022)

Ho went on to acknowledge that some parents may not condone their 13-year-olds wearing makeup, but Ho argued that tweens are “hugely independent” and that she’s simply fulfilling a demand.  

“Whether some parents agree with this or not, this generation does want their own products. They want their own routine. They’re hugely independent.

In a conspicuous contradiction, Brown wrote that parents want: “[...] beauty products that are safe for their kids.” [Emphasis added] But that: “Parents also want beauty products for children that don’t degrade their self-confidence or sexualize them.” [Emphasis added]

And Ho added to the conspicuous contradiction by stating:

“We don’t really consider it a ‘cosmetic’ line in the traditional sense, and the goal is certainly not glamour or beauty, but rather to allow children [...] to unleash their imagination and express their unique style with safe, kid-appropriate products. Rather than restricting or inhibiting their natural curiosity, why not provide them with fun, safe products to express themselves with?”

Evereden's Kids Tinted Lip Oil in Ruby Red

Thus, Ho doesn’t “really” consider the $16 Ruby Red Lip[stick] Oil to be a glamorizing or beautifying cosmetic. 

However, Brooke C. shared in her 5 star review (09/12/23): 

The lip oils were a hit! My kiddos like doing “lipstick like mommy!” 

Jessica F. wrote in her 5 star review (09/08/23): 

Obsessed with the new Evereden AT PLAY Tinted Lip Oil. I like the Ruby Red color for a bit of a pop” 

And Karen V. asked in her 5 star review (09/03/23): 

“Why didn’t they have this when I was a kid? My 11 year old loves this stuff. It makes her feel as if she’s wearing makeup [...]”

YOU ARE SO NOT INVITED TO MY BAT MITZVAH (2023): Was Teen Stacy Sexualized for Streams?

I first wrote about a bat mitzvah in the first edition of The Allure of Nymphets when I wrote about Project X (2012), which is a raunchy teen comedy that had multiple teen girl-on-girl kissing scenes, a variety of foreplay scenes - from threesomes to standard twosomes, and the schoolgirls in the film happily complied with the Naked Girls Only swimming pool policy. In the film, after the police arrived on the scene of the bawdy high school party to investigate a noise complaint, the police asked, “Is there an adult here we might speak with?” Costa (Oliver Cooper), a Jewish teen transport from Queens, replied, “You’re speaking with one […] in my culture I’ve been a man since my 13th birthday.”

Subsequently, in preparation for the third edition of The Allure of Nymphets, I’ve written a number of blog posts about bat and bar mitzvahs. For instance, I blogged about how Michiko Kakutani wrote in his New York Times review of Nick McDonell's national bestseller Twelve (Grove Press, 2003) that McDonell's novel: “[...] gives us some digitally clear snapshots of life in the upscale ZIP codes of millennial Manhattan." Some of the snapshots from upscale millennial Manhattan that McDonell portrayed were: a "first blow job at a bat mitzvah", teens viewing porn, teen sex for drugs, and: "[...] girls who talk about how they try to fuck with their shrinks. Or how they actually try to fuck their shrinks."

In Woody Allen’s A Rainy Day in New York (2019), I wrote about Gatsby (Timothée Chalamet) whom shared some information about Amy - his gorgeous and sexually advanced Jewish high school sweetheart. 

"Amy was gorgeous and so sexually advanced. Word on Amy was she performed oral sex at a bar mitzvah. I think they should make that a part of every Jewish holiday [...] And what a great Hanukkah gift."

Donny’s Bar Mitzvah (2021)

I wrote about Donny’s Bar Mitzvah (2021). The headline of Kristen Yoonsoo Kim's New York Times review referred to the film as "A Rude and Raunchy Coming-of-Age", which may be due to the fact that approximately three minutes into the film, that’s set in Donny’s Bar Mitzvah, streamers are given the impression that 13-year-old Donny loved DP; however, it’s not clear if Donny loved participating in threesomes or if he enjoyed watching double-penetration porn - or both.

In addition, we learned a lot about Hannah, aka Handjob Hannah, Donny's middle-school classmate. We learned that she got "finger blasted" in class while watching Bill Nye The Science Guy, and allegedly Hannah didn't restrict her sexual services to handjobs. Here's the dialogue that took place between some middle-schoolers at the bar mitzvah:

"Handjob Hannah?"

"You know she got finger blasted last week in class while watching Bill Nye The Science Guy?"

"Yes, I know that."

"Dude. Hannah is a whore. Kiss her? Yo man. You're gonna get a blow job tonight [during the bar mitzvah]!"

"I mean. He's right. You are gonna get your dick sucked bro."

Although, Hannah's dad affectionately called her "sugar tits", Hannah did not participate in the bar mitzvah’s teen girl-on-girl kiss challenge, but after a nubile nymphet asked a boy, “Is it true you’ve got a big dick?”, Hannah, along with the other middle schoolers, shouted repeatedly, “Show us your dick! Show us your dick!” Consequently, Hannah was awestruck. 

Of course, not all of the raunchy teen behavior happened during the bar or bat mitzvahs. For example, in James Franco’s Palo Alto, yes that James Franco, April attended a bat mitzvah where Shauna became a "woman", but before going to the bat mitzvah, April went to Mr. B's house to babysit Michael - Mr. B's five-year-old son. (April described Mr. B as having: "[...] a good body, good hair, and a nice smile") However, it wasn’t until days after the Shauna’s bat mitzvah did April return to Mr. B's house where 14-year-old April and Mr. B, April’s high school soccer coach, had sex on Mr. B’s canapé. 

As for Netflix’s You Are So Not Invited to My Bat Mitzvah (2023), let’s begin with IMDb’s synopsis:

Stacy [Sunny Sandler, the daughter of Adam] and Lydia are BFFs who've always dreamed about having epic Bat Mitzvahs. However, things start to go comically awry when a popular boy and middle school drama threatens their friendship and their rite of passage.

Minutes into the film, streamers were reminded that, like Project X’s Costa, Stacy’s Bat Mitzvah would be her “kick off [into] adulthood”

DJ Schmuley, “All right, mishpachah, please say hello to our newest and most fabulous adult Stacy Friedman.”

Stacy, “Your bat mitzvah is the first day of your adult life.” “And what better way to kick off adulthood than with the hottest guy in seventh grade?”

Maybe that’s why, to the possible dismay of (practicing) muslim and (ultra) orthodox jewish streamers, Stacy appeared to be sexualized and/or self-sexualized in the film - especially when one compares Stacy in the film to Stacy in the novel (Little, Brown and Company, 2023).

For example, minutes into the film, 13-year-old Stacy fantasized that she was on a stage at her bat mitzvah in front of a throng of cheering onlookers before whom she ripped off her maxi length dress to reveal a hot pink micro mini skirt. After Stacy returned to reality, in a full length mirror, she surveyed her derrière, and hoisted her breasts, which were now behind a blue and white mini skirt.

And not even 15 minutes into the film, in what began like a (hebephile and podophile’s) dream sequence, streamers were slowly given privy to Stacy in the prone position with her buttocks prominent and bare feet pronounced. 

Later, on a dare, Stacy jumped off The Ledge into the lake, which, somehow, caused her bloodied pad to dislodge and float; however, in the novel, Stacy hadn’t reached puberty. And in the novel, Lydia, Stacy’s best friend, got into the water at the quarry where it was rumored that Lydia and Andy, Stacy’s crush, had teen sex. Kym said, “I heard Lydia and Andy did it in the water at the quarry. What a slut.”

In the novel, Stacy narrated: “Did I mention I still hadn’t gotten my period and that I found a stray hair on my nipple [...]” But in the film, after Stacey heard a rumor that Andy touched Lydia’s “under boob in PE”, Stacy posted the following on the 7th_Grade_Rumorz Instagram account where 7th graders were encouraged to SPILL THE TEA - EVERYTHING’S ANONYMOUS: “Lydia has long black hairs on her nipples”

Lydia, “You wouldn’t happen to know why people keep asking me if they can floss their teeth with my nipple hair today, do you, Stacy?”  

Stacy, “How do I know your nipples are hairless?”

Lydia, “Because you do!”

Hence, in the film, it’s implied that Stacy saw Lydia’s nipples. And Megan asked, “So, Lydia, any crushes?” But after Lydia replied, “No, not really. There’s not a lot of opt [sic] for boys in our grade,” Anya asked Lydia, “Oh, so you only like boys?” And as for the novel, there was a rumor going around the middle-school that Lydia was using Andy as a “decoy”, because she was “really in love” with Stacy. 

Kym informed Stacy, “I heard that Trampy said that Lydia Katz was just using Andy as a decoy because she’s really in love with You” 

Thus, the question remains, is it being implied in the film and the novel that Stacy and Lydia were (mainstream) teen bi-sexuals?

Subsequently in the film, when Stacy tried on a dress for her bat mitzvah, I was surprised that Sammi Cohen, the film’s director, chose to have streamers focus on Stacy’s hot pink bra, but maybe Cohen was inspired by a similar scene in the novel, but in the novel, Stacy’s “belly and underwear were exposed”. 

Exclusively in the film, during an impromptu photoshoot, Stacy reminded her friends, Nikki and Tara, “Oh my God, we’re women now.” Ergo, Nikki took iPhone photos while Tara did the lighting as Stacy posed seductively and repeatedly in a micro mini skirt that was so small and tight that, once again, Stacy’s bra was exposed.

After the photoshoot, Stacy accidentally sexted texted the sexy photos to Andy whom approved. Consequently, Stacy and Andy left class and kissed in the temple in front of the Torah!

In terms of middle schoolers sexting, Stacy's text to Andy reminded me of Swiffer Girl, because it could be that one day a schoolgirl is texting a schoolboy photos of her posing seductively in a micro mini but the next day, like Swiffer Girl, she’s sexting performances of teen autoerotism with a Swiffer broom. 

And Stacy and Andy kissing in the temple reminded me of Restless Virgins: Love, Sex, and Survival in Prep School, and the Gossip Girl reboot. 

In Restless Virgins, a New York Times Bestseller, Reed, a Milton Academy prep schoolboy, was led to the Apthorp chapel by a schoolgirl whom performed oral sex on Reed near the chapel’s “massive pipe organ”, which happened after Reed “fingered her briefly”. And on Gossip Girls’ “Once Upon a Time in the Upper West” (s01e07), three Constance Billard students had a teen orgy in the prep school’s chapel - beneath the crucifix. 

 

In the film, not only did Stacy kiss Andy but Lydia kissed Andy as well, which caused Stacy to ask about Lydia’s kissing skills.

Stacy, “Is Lydia a good kisser?”

Andy, “She’s a’ight.”

Stacy, “Probably because you were her first kiss.”

Andy, “No, she told me she’s kissed a bunch of guys before.”

Stacy, “At camp?”

Andy, “Yes.”

Did Stacy not know that Lydia “kissed a bunch of guys” at camp or was Lydia lying? #rhetoricalquestion. But Stacy was correct to assume that Lydia’s raunchy behavior happened at camp, because camp is notorious for its tween and teen raunchy behavior. For example, on the "Postcards from Europe" episode of the Hot Girls Talks podcast (Aug 18, 2022), Carly shared with Halley and Jaz:

"If you went to camp, you'd know that you saw plenty of vaginas in a lifetime and probably the inside of them [...] because at camp you just are, like, crazy. Yeah, it's just a thing. I don't know, like, people that went to camp know. Just camp things."

Lena Dunham shared in her memoir, Not That Kind of Girl, that when she was a 14-year-old summer camper, she found her “truest love” whom was none other than 21-year-old Johnny. Dunham wrote:

“[Johnny] was blond, from South Carolina, and just shy of twenty-two.” In her bunk, Lena fantasized about discarding her “[...] clothes, approaching Johnny, and letting him put his hands all over [...]” her body.

And 17-year-old Danielle confessed in “Reality Check From Young Voices”, a chapter in Cappiello and McInerney’s Cappiello’s Slut: A Play and Guidebook, that “lots of sexual firsts” happened at her “typical Jewish summer camp” (e.g., filming (oral) sex tapes):

“I go to this, where promiscuous behavior is practically encouraged and cultivated [...] with no parental supervision, there are lots of sexual firsts for everyone [...] There is one girl in particular, Georgia, who is really petite and very pretty [...] Josh and another boy coerced - basically forced - Georgia to give them blow jobs, while others filmed it on their phones.”

Let's share just two more peculiar bits of dialogue that were in the film but that were not in the novel. In the film, before Stacy jumped from The Ledge, a 7th grader shared that she was distraught over the news that her mother wouldn’t let her get lip filler, but she was comforted by the news from another 7th grader that Botox was allowed, which could be used for lips.  

“Ugh, my mom said I have to wait a year before I can get lip filler.”

“She said you can have Botox. Just use that on your lips.” 

“Yeah.”

And for some reason Lydia asked, “Remember when that string on my tampon broke? (I will not share what teen streaming show Lydia’s broken tampon string reminded me of.)

Lastly, the rhetorical question remains, why did it appear that Stacy was sexualized and/or self-sexualized in the film - especially when one compares the film to the novel. So much so that the film received a PG-13 slash PARENTS STRONGLY CAUTIONED rating due to SOME CRUDE/SUGGESTIVE LANGUAGE and Some Material [That] May Be Inappropriate for Children Under 13. Yet, unsurprisingly, considering the allure of the nymphet in the film, You Are So Not Invited to My Bat Mitzvah earned a 92% TOMATOMETER.

Interestingly, Rosenbloom (nom de plume Amanda Stern) didn't seem to mind the liberties that the screenwriters and Cohen took with her novel, which makes sense because Stern, who went to the Nightingale-Bamford School, shared with Emma Allen in the New Yorker piece "A Gen X-er Goes Bat-Mitzvah-Dress Shopping" that after she called a friend in her Manhattan "middle-school clique" a "cock-sucking dyke", another friend from the clique taught Stern how to perform oral sex, and the friend inserted a tampon into Stern. #DionneWarwick