Trying to keep up with teens and their slang and phrases is not for the faint of heart, both because their vocabulary changes all the time and also because a lot of the time, what they are saying seems to make no sense at all.
However, as parents, in order to keep our children safe and well, experts say we do need to keep a finger on the pulse – at least about the stuff that can actually be of real harm to teens and lead to bullying and body shaming.
And two of the latter is trending at the moment, according to Huffington Post, and here is what parents need to know.
Phrases teens use to body shame each other
Say hello to ‘manlet’ and ‘hiplet’ – the two most idiotic and ridiculous phrases teens are throwing around now, and that will make you feel like everyone should just log off the internet by now.
‘Manlet’, just to clarify, is a sort of a derogatory phrase that’s been used online for years as a way to height-shame shorter men and boys. As for ‘hiplet’, this term is, from my understanding, about body-shaming women and girls for having ‘hip dips’ (inward curves located below the hips and just above the thighs) as a retaliation to ‘manlet’ abuse.
According to discussions on Reddit, the ‘hiplet movement is an allegory to heightism’ – in other words, men are using the term ‘hiplet’ to make a bigger point about prejudice against shorter men.
However – can we agree both are insane, and surely just two new ways teens can hurt each other with words?
@goateejay Manlet = hiplet is the closest one-to-one comparison we have because both are about genetics, bone structure, and things people mostly cannot control. If men cannot control how their skeleton contributes to their height, women cannot fully control how their skeleton contributes to hip width either. It is not just about men being shorter than you, it is about men not meeting the made-up 6-foot threshold. Both are common insecurities, and ignoring the logic of the comparison just because it points the mirror back does not make the argument any less valid. #manlet #bodyimage #bp #hiplet #fyp ♬ original sound – GOATeejay
Body shaming is nothing new, of course, but there is no denying social media is making it much harder for teens and young people to avoid it.
Men have shared online how the term ‘manlet’ has made them feel “depressed and insecure”, while women are saying ‘hiplet’ is just another insecurity to add to the list.
‘Social media has a way of taking a perfectly normal human characteristic and turning it into a ‘flaw’ overnight, explains family psychotherapist Fiona Yassin to HuffPost.
‘Terms like ‘manlet’ or ‘hiplet’ are designed to shame people by making them feel as though their body is somehow outside the norm, when in reality height, hip shape and body proportions vary enormously and are entirely unique.’
Talking to teens about body shaming and bullying
Yassin says as parents, it is often our natural instinct to just tell our kids to ignore someone saying something mean about them. And we think that by telling them that, they will feel empowered to not care about what everyone else is saying.
However, the psychotherapist warns, for young people it can be a lot harder to just ‘ignore’ comments made about them, whether online to to their faces.
Instead, Yassin explains, parents should acknowledge what their teens are saying, validate their feelings, and remind them that these insults say far more about the culture of online comparison than they do about the person being targeted.’
‘You could ask them open questions such as, ‘how did that make you feel in the moment?’ or ‘what do you think those comments were trying to achieve?’ she explains, adding that this can help young people process the experience rather than internalise it.
‘Children engaging in viral trends often don’t fully understand the potential impact on others,’ continued Yassin.
‘The goal for parents is to reintroduce mentalising – the ability to reflect on the thoughts, feelings, and intentions of both themselves and other people. When mentalising is ‘off-track’, children may act or speak without considering how it lands.’
