#mgtm posting

the realistic side of my brain: gretchen wieners is an extremely insecure 16 year old girl. her fixation and relationship with regina can easily be described and seen as an effect of that: she’s insecure, and so she seeks out regina’s love and attention and admiration, even if it means bringing other people down. even if it means destroying something else. and this is magnified even further once you view gretchen as a young girl of color. she would do ANYTHING to receive validation from her white peers. to feel like she fits in. the line “mama called be beautiful, don’t believe her anymore” hits even harder within this context. teenage girls of color (especially in predominantly white areas) are told and shown that they’re not beautiful. that they’re not worthy. by their white peers, whether it’s deliberate or not. so gretchen seeking this sort of thing out from regina, from cady etc all stems back to the fact that she’s not comfortable in herself. she begins with regina, realizes regina doesn’t actually value her as a person, and yet keeps going back. she continues with cady, realizes cady doesn’t value her as a person, and yet keeps going back. this cycle she puts herself in is all influenced by the fact that she’s insecure of course, but most importantly, that she’s a woman of color who has been told/shown for most of her life that she isn’t good enough