#yj thoughts

both tai and jackie use nat as a sort of punching bag to improve their social standing. tai tries to deflect nat's reasonable criticism about the situation with allie by insulting her, while jackie attempts to distract from her own fears and insecurities in the wilderness by going against nat. even though it's pretty unprovoked in both situations, they both choose to not only attack nat, but also bring slutshaming into it, which imo is directly tied to classism (more on this in a moment). i think it's interesting to see how the social hierachy in the team is influenced by classism and how this developes in the wilderness.

your class position can influence your sexual activity in many ways and i think you can see examples of this in nat. @softantlers has made a really good post about nat, poverty and gender a while ago that i think everbody should read. among other things they argue that the misogyny nat experiences often intersects with classism. for example both tai and jackie combine their slutshaming with somewhat classist insults. tai tells nat she "smells like a wino", a term that is specifically associated with homelessness (source) and jackie calls her a "burnout", which is associated with addiction and lazyness (source).

furthermore, nat's sexual experiences themselves might be influenced by her experience with poverty. for example, richer families are more likely to have the capacity to surveil their children's free time, including their sexual encounters. we see nat's dad get specifically mad, because her mom failed to keep an eye on her due to her alcoholism (something obviously not inherent, but connected to poverty). on the other hand, it seems logical that someone with "less to lose" regarding their social standing also cares less about their reputation and is more open to different sexual experiences.

it is also important to note that poor women and girls are far more vulnerable to sexual assault, since poverty increases the risk of getting caught up in dangerous situations and once in that situation, it's more difficult to get out due to lack of social/economic power (source). women in poverty are also less likely to receive help in abuse situations due to the belief that they can take it (more on this here). of course this is really simplified and generalized, but it seems to fit nat's experiences in some ways. while nat generally seems to enjoy sex, she also recounts having a negative (possibly non-consensual) experience with an older guy at a show and jackie hints at nat being mistreated by men. in short, a connection between nat's sexuality and her class status can definitely be assumed and this also shapes the way others see her.

tai and jackie definitely have a different class position than nat, but i'd argue that there's also a clear distinction between tai and jackie themselves. jackie is heavily implied to be upper class, while we don't really see hints at this position for tai. she's definitely well-off, but her living situation reads more like a stable middle class household to me. but of course, this is only speculation. i think the difference becomes more obvious when you look at the way jackie and tai are navigating their class status.

it's often shown that jackie grew up sheltered, making it difficult for her to adapt to living in the wilderness. i think this also goes hand in hand with a kind of classblindness. to me it seems that jackie wasn't really aware of her privileged situation until the crash. she never had to worry about her social standing, naturally having a strong influence on the team and all her needs met. before the crash, she seemed to have a good relationship with nat and i don't think jackie consciously looked down on her. this changes when jackie suddenly loses her influence in the wilderness. her attack on nat seems like an attempt to reinforce the previous social hierachy, clinging to her former privilege of "upper-class girl".

meanwhile, tai seems to be aware of the insecurity of her social status. she's puts in hard (and if necessary ugly) work for her goals and things aren't just given to her the way they are to jackie - even though tai is a better player than jackie, she isn't made captain etc.

due to her sexuality tai's social position is unstable and her attempts to keep it secret mean that she constantly has to watch her words and actions. even though she brushes it off as "just not being interested in the drama" when talking to van, it's clear that she's very aware of the social risks of "being found out" which is also acknowledged by coach ben in the trial and obviously van in the adult timeline.

her Blackness also forces tai to constantly navigate different forms of respectability politics. i'm white so i obviously don't have the best understanding of this, if you're Black and have another/better understanding of this please chime in!! generally, i think these rules she has to follow are pretty obvious in the adult timeline, especially in s1ep4 when she's at that rich people event talking to diane rafelson.

but even in the teen timeline tai often takes on a mediating role (e.g. between jackie & nat, shauna & lottie etc... she pretty much intervenes in every conflict) and i think she constantly feels the need to be in control of the group and herself, only allowing some parts of herself to show.

in this interview (starting 2:15) the interviewer asks jasmin if other tai could be an allegory for codeswitching with "regular" tai being the side of her that has to adhere to respectability politics and other tai representing her repressed Black rage, which i think is a really intriguing way to see other tai. and in this interview (starting 17:20) jasmin says that she believes tai would have pretended to eat jackie if other tai hadn't taken over, so that she wouldn't be ostracized by the group.

tldr, i think taissa is very aware of her instable and vulnerable position in the group and puts in a lot of effort to be accepted by the people around her.

and in that sense i think tai's slutshaming behaviour can not only be read as a deflection from her own mistakes, but also shows tai's deeper understanding of the social hierachy. since she knows her own position is unsteady, she goes against someone whose position is even less secure. her choice to use nat's sexual experience against her is interesting since she has to know that her own sexuality isn't really more socially accepted. moreover, she's also kind of doing the same things she shames nat for doing (smoking and sex), just in private. i wonder if tai's issue with nat partially comes from a bitterness that nat is able to these things so openly, while she can't really afford to do that.

tai's conflict with nat pretty much stops in the wilderness. this obviously has to do with a lot of factors, mainly them having bigger problems (and imo tai has pretty reasonable priorities). but i also think the fact that tai is granted more freedoms regarding her sexuality allows her to be more forgiving towards nat.