High School Confidential
I’m not sure why it bothered me.
A youth ministry newsletter that I subscribe to announced that the WE network would be showing a series of documentaries entitled “High School Confidential” in which they followed 12 teenage girls from their 9-12 grade years in Overland Park, Kansas from 2002-2006. There are 8 episodes, each focusing on 1-3 of the girls per episode.
It’s not overly sensational, and for that reason will probably not register on most pop culture radars. But, of the 3 episodes I’ve seen, there are some great interviews of teenage girls telling about what they are experiencing and how they process what’s going on. You see a lot of hurt, abandonment, family pressure, and the incredible importance of friends.
Anyway, I started this post to comment on something that happened in one of the episodes:
In the episode about Jessi, we see a girl go through a painful and lonely journey through high school. She almost fails out of school her freshman year, and transfers to an alternative school that will help her through her learning disabilities. There, she find a group of friends that function as a family unit. They even have “the house” where they all hang out and there is never any adult supervision, making drinking binges and sex common activities. She even gets pregnant and decides to keep the baby, but has a miscarriage after a couple months. Her life is chronicled through a series of dating relationships.
One of her passions is acting, so as she makes future plans, she auditions for an acting school in LA. She gets in and is even given a scholarship. Her senior year revolves around making plans for that transition from Kansas to California and her new life there (without her friends and current boyfriend). The episode ends with scenes of her heading into the terminal and waiting for her plane while her current boyfriend sadly looks on in heartbreak.
We see the plane take off, then an epilogue appears on the screen. Jessi goes to LA and returns to Kansas 10 days later after having a panic attack. She now works in a Wal-Mart.
My jaw dropped as, after I had gone with this girl through her highs and lows, hoping she will land in a place that helps her find confidence and personal fulfillment, realize she ends up right where she started.
The scene that bothered me was toward the end, where she was talking with a teacher at some type of graduation banquet/ceremony event. The teacher is asking her questions about her plans, and she is telling all about her accomplishments and what she is going to do with the rest of her life- a plan that ultimately doesn’t weather 10 days.
Once again, I’m not sure why it bothered me. Maybe it was because I could guess the outcome before it came, all the while hoping it would be different. We ask all these questions of our young people about their futures, and each one comes up with a strong, positive, and promising answer, while deep down the answer is still “I don’t know”.
Have any thoughts on this? Other than the fact that I have watched the WE network… ever?