Cluless is an Understatement

Jen Ackerman
Nina Perez
Feburary 17, 2010
WST 3015

Clueless is an Understatement

1995’s Clueless forever shaped and engrained the valley girl image in all of our heads and in society forever. Following the life of a wealthy, blonde, skinny, teenage girl, the plot of this movie actually mocks and satirizes the valley girl stereotypes and ends with the sweet message of individuality (Clueless). Main character Cher Horowitz learns the lesson of accepting people for who they are, of course this harshly contrasts the extremely shallow and materialistic traits her and her friends all share. Overall this movie focuses around Cher and her thought process for almost all topics, unfortunately Cher emphasizes many of the stereotypes associated with the “valley girl” image.
As Cher and her friends enjoy their lunch at the mall the topic of sex comes up. Her friend Tai willingly admits to having sex, shocking Cher (Clueless). This scene is a perfect example of the intersectionality within sexuality (Kirk, Gwyn, and Okazawa-Rey 13). Cher’s friend is presented as from a lower class throughout the film and is the first to present herself in a sexual way, while Cher and the other upper class friend are proud they are virgins. Now this scene presents the lower class friend as promiscuous and sexually explorative. Now, Tai is a girl that Cher and her friends almost seem to pity,continuing the very clear division between the classes. Cher, the white, upper class, female is the only “real” virgin, who coincidentally is moral enough to wait for marriage, whereas Tai was not. In this scene it is also assumed by Tai that the African American friend Dionne was not a virgin either, who actually had to defend her virginity (Clueless). Racism and classism very much make their way through into the realm of sexuality and it’s assumed that a women’s sexuality can be assumed by things like their class, or their race. This is only one strong example of countless stereotypical attachments that come along with women’s sexuality in our media.
This film also features the topic of homosexuality. When it comes to this, Clueless does not skip in the stereotypes here either. Cher’s P.E. teacher is described as “same sex oriented,” and throughout the film is very aggressive and always dressed in what to be more masculine outfits. She is unlike all the other women in film and the typical myths about lesbians come through with this character (Clueless). The other thought to be homosexual character is Christian, a boy Cher had an interest in. It is suspected that he is gay because of the way he dresses, talks, dances, and even walks(Clueless). Both of these characters are complete stereotypes. As stated in the text, the stereotypes portrayed in the media again and again have a very lasting and harmful impression (Kirk, Gwyn, and Okazawa-Rey 159). When it comes to homosexuality Clueless was no different.
This movie is very interesting to me because as mentioned before it ends with a respectable theme and message. Cher accepts Josh for who he is and Tai also embraces who she is (Clueless). When these two characters do this happiness seems to ensues. Clueless does a good job portraying a girl striving to be better despite her extremely privileged and sheltered life. While I wouldn’t say Cher is by any means a good role model for young girls, she is not the worst either.

Works Cited
Clueless. Dir. Amy Heckerling. Perf. Alicia Silverstone and Paul Rudd. Paramount Pictures, 1995. DVD.

Kirk, Gwyn, and Margo Okazawa-Rey. "Women's Rights, Women's Liberation, Women's Studies." Women's Lives Multicultural Perspectives. New York: McGraw-Hill Humanities/Social Sciences/Languages, 2003. 13. Print.

Kirk, Gwyn, and Margo Okazawa-Rey. "Women's Sexuality." Women's Lives Multicultural Perspectives. New York: McGraw-Hill Humanities/Social Sciences/Languages, 2003. 150. Print.