Ad-dress-ing a Serious Problem

Facebook Group Reveals Differences Between the Genders

Caroline Lee

Staff Writer

    Dibs.  With that, another prom dress has just become off limits to anyone else attending the May 31, 2014 combined junior and senior prom, since the arrival of a new Facebook group that has people talking.   

    On March 2, 2014, the group was created to help eliminate the age old problem of two girls wearing the same dress to prom.  Members of the group can post pictures of their dresses and call “dibs” to ensure that they are the only one with their dream dress.  This was also done last year for the Class of 2014’s junior prom, but with double the number of potential attendees, there is even more room for problems.

    “Since it’s combined, there’s more pressure to get a dress fast,” senior Bidisa Mukherjee said.  “There’s more competition.”

    In fact, it is this sense of rivalry, along with prices and selection, that fuels this social media frenzy.

    “It’s definitely more out of control,” Mukherjee said.  “Before people would wait two weeks before they posted their dress.  Now, everything is rushed and other than the fact that it’s combined, I think that another problem is that prom is much later and the time to buy dresses is now because dresses are cheaper.”

    Rushing to post dresses immediately has left many students disheartened and outraged and others, like sophomores Ishan Kaul, Tejas Priyadarshan, and Miraj Patel, searching for some comic relief to the seriousness.

    “I saw talk about [the group] on Twitter and thought it would be funny to get in,” Kaul said.  “I got in, went in my mom’s closet, got a dress, and took a selfie.  Then, I invited all my friends.”

    After their joke, the sophomores were removed from the page and the privacy settings to the group were changed, but Priyadarshan has no regrets about what they did.

    “We just wanted to lighten the mood,” Priyadarshan said.  “I feel like it’s a good way to not wear the same dress, but I think people are taking it too seriously.”

    These differences in opinions are examples of just how differently some boys feel about prom than girls, with the former criticizing the girls of going too far, but not blaming gender for the sentiments.

    “It’s unnecessary,” junior Elijah Brooks said.  “Why would you make a big deal for something that’s one day?  I think that they should just buy a dress they like and not care if they have the same as someone else.  I don’t think it’s a girl thing though; I think they’re just making a big deal about it like they’re running for president.”

    The two genders tend to have different priorities; girls tend to view prom as an opportunity to stand out, whereas guys tend to prepare for the event with less concern for dress.

    “Guys just have the same thing,” Brooks said.  “We just have a good time and take pictures.  It’s weird if you’re not wearing the same thing as everyone else.”

    Although the differences in opinion may seem only to affect the girls, the boys point out that it affects them too.

      “We feel discriminated against,” Priyadarshan said.  “It shouldn’t be a surprise what the girl is wearing, if they have a date.  The guys should be allowed to know.”

    No matter what argument you side with, it is apparent that this Facebook group has shown how present and significant pom has become to AHS and the teen culture.

    “The page doesn’t really affect the turnout of prom, but it does get the girls excited,” senior and Class of 2014 Prom Commissioner Mayron Mulugeta said.