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Why am I watching Sweet Sixteen on MTV? I’m not sure, I just planted myself on the couch this morning and this show was on. I half-pay attention as I surf the web on my laptop, which was a gracious gift from my grandma for school, something I’m sure would be overlooked by one of the spoiled teenie wretches that appear on MTV’s show. After all, a Dell laptop is no BMW X5 or Mercedes coupe. And you’ve got to think, what does a kid like this, especially a girl, do for her wedding? When you’re looking at a birthday bash complete with food, entertainment—which is usually someone famous, and a brand new car to seal the deal, $200,000 or more is not uncommon for the parents to spend for one night.
Most of the girls on the show, and the show is mostly girls, select a few guys to escort (read carry into the party Cleopatra-style) them on their special night. I guess money really does talk and it must talk pretty loud for a girl to simply walk into a gym and tell a young man she’s having a party and would like him to take off his shirt so she can decide if he’s good enough to be a part of the festivities. If a request in the gym is not enough, the girl may decide to have an audition at her home where the group of men can embarrass themselves on television as they’re ordered to complete an obstacle course in the hopes of being selected as one of the chosen few. Is it really worth it just to have the opportunity to carry a girl to her party and achieve your thirty seconds of fame? God help you if you mess up or step out of rhythm because I tell you what, don’t mess with the temper of a spoiled heiress—the claws will come out and the girl that was checking you out last week will turn into the fierce jungle cat that adorns her $95,000 sports car waiting outside the party.
If you think it’s bad that these girls have learned that they can simply buy whatever they want, including people, hold tight because it gets worse. What’s a sweet sixteen party without a stunning dress to further make you the envy of all your “friends”? I’m sorry but sending out gaudy, frilled invitations to a select population of your grade to further your wealth-based status and put jealousy in the hearts of those not invited is downright cruel and unnecessary. If surrounding yourself with “yes-men and women” isn’t enough, perhaps you should take a few of the moochers you think are your friends on a trip to Paris to find a dress for your party. When you can scoff at the $13,000 dollar price tag for a pair of earrings, or the one-time-use $20,000 dress, you have got a serious problem. If you ask me, or any other sane individual for that matter, I would like to see a little more return on such a large investment.
Ignoring the malicious mindset of these vanity-driven teens, if you can, examine more closely the root of the problem: the parents. As a simple viewer, I do not have the privilege of knowing what these teens’ parents do for a living. Still, it’s easy to see that they are rich beyond belief when you tabulate the horrific expenses of the parties they pay for. It is simply incredible when you take stock of the values they teach their kids by catering to their every desire and not batting an eye when they are screamed at and ordered around by their spoiled offspring. Sure, it’s okay to get your child a nice gift for their big birthday, but does a $50,000 sports car really tell them that you love them or does it speak to them in an entirely different way? You can’t tell a wealthy heiress that you love her with words because she has come to expect something tangible, a material possession to soothe her woes. Because we all know how difficult and stressful it is to be rich and wake up each morning to your mansion of a home, your boats, your cars and have to make the impossible decision of whether you’re going to take the Mercedes to Saks Fifth Avenue or Tiffany’s to go shopping. Actually, just ask your parents, they’ll probably just take you to both.
Now I jokingly paint a picture of the typical day of the wealthy girl you see on the show, but in all seriousness, I don’t know what it’s like to be exceedingly wealthy. If you’re reading this, you probably don’t either. However, you have to wonder, if you did know what is was like, if you were a spoiled child or the parent of one, just because you had the money, would you spend it in such a manner? I would like to believe that frivolity would not be a part of my life had I such wealth, but how do I really know I wouldn’t act just like them? I would like to think my frugal attitude would stay with me had I the opportunity to live the life but it is impossible to tell. Are these individuals just like us, except that they have come into such wealth and are now “living it up” or are they in a completely different social class, one that we will never reach? You may have your own answer to the question but I believe that the answer is simply put: both. Given the division between the lifestyles, we can never truly understand or correctly form a holistic and unbiased opinion about the way in which they live. However, as a result of the media, the televised exploits of the “rich and famous” only raise their pedestal higher and further increase the ideological and metaphysical separation between two groups of apparently-different although fundamentally similar individuals.
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