Euphoria, a new obsession amongst teenagers, follows several
struggling, dysfunctional teens centering around Rue, a 17-year-old
drug addict grappling with multiple mental disorders. While the show
promises a diverse representation of today’s youth, it blatantly fails to
capture the essence of what it means to be a teenager with its highly
sexualised and problematic depiction of activities like drug abuse,
porn trafficking, and child porn.
As the curtain lifts, the show wastes no time in painting three horrid
scenarios in the first episode itself: The statutory rape between Jules
and Nate’s father, Maddy and Tyler having sex in the swimming pool
to make her ex-boyfriend jealous( the true horridness of this plotline
only reveals itself in the episodes to come), and lastly, the show's
introduction of Cassie through her leaked sex tape. Later, we see how
her boyfriend forms an opinion of her based on what he had seen in
the video his friends had circulated. As he throws her roughly on the
bed, imitating the guy's aggression in the tape, Cassie is caught by
surprise. This, however, is not where the show strays from reality. I
have heard of boys WhatsApp groups that exchange nudes of women
they've been intimate with. As they exchange accounts with words
coloured with sexism and shame, they title girls like Cassie to be sluts.
Euphoria does present the reality, but it hardly ventures to do anything
more. Cassie's categorisation as a 'slut' is seen as a fact, and not even
her boyfriend cares to refute it. Rue’s voiceover does attempt to talk
about how the porn industry that teenagers are fed on has indoctrinated
its viewers. The unrealistic porn that focuses on male pleasure can fool
the malleable generation into having unrealistic expectations in bed.
As porn glorifies violence and aggression, it encourages underaged
teenagers to put themselves in vulnerable situations seeking the sexual
satisfaction they have been taught to want. Even though Rue's voiceover is meant to be a sort of a critique, the show's inability to portray that in their plotline leaves the viewer questioning whether Euphoria is any different than porn. For Euphoria too shrouds problems like child pornography, fake allegations, peer pressure, drug
abuse, Madonna- whore complex with a tint of titillating sexual
temptations, fooling teenagers into confusing vulnerability as a ground
for sexual conquest.
The trope of presenting women in radical and vulnerable situations as
sexually empowering feminist decisions finds its culmination in Kat's
journey from an insecure teen to a Camgirl. Early on, we get a peek at
her insecurities as she is eager to lose her virginity, for she believes it's
the one thing that's keeping her from entirely relating to her sexually
active peers. As she sheds off her clothes for the McKay twins, Kat
though visibly uncomfortable, gives in to the need to fit in and be seen
as the accommodating 'Cool Girl'. The twins give her an ultimatum:
she must either be 'a prude'; or 'a slut'. Instead of criticising this
patriarchal dichotomy, Euphoria follows Kat as she chooses to be the
latter, as being a 'slut' will give her more social currency. Euphoria
trips over the fine line that exists between a young woman believing
she’s making an empowered decision about her body on her own
terms and that of a woman sidelined by conventional patriarchal
notions of beauty, who is eager to do anything to feel desirable, thus
making a decision that is not her own but is one that is manipulated by
the power dynamics in place.
After realising Kat's sex tape was uploaded on Pornhub by one of the
twins, Kat tries in vain to get it off the internet. In the end, She signs
up for a Pornhub membership to become a cam girl, seeking to turn
the narrative around. Euphoria does not talk about how Kat can never
truly take charge of her story in the online world where people are
eager to comment and control women's bodies. Euphoria fails to
sensitise its viewers on social media and cyberbullying intricacies that
Kat can be increasingly subjected to as a minor. At several points, it
feels like the characters of Euphoria, due to ignorance, foolishly think
they have the upper hand on topics that are far more adult than them.
Euphoria becomes unbearingly challenging to watch at multiple points
because of the paedophilic imagery that runs throughout. An instance
of this would be in Nate’s, the white jock that stands for toxic
masculinity, description of the ideal girl. He stresses the absence of
female body hair as a characteristic of 'perfect femininity'. Often,
what the show characterises as femininity- innocent, submissive,
petite, smooth skin, and no body hair are also descriptive of childlike.
How can the ideal marker of femininity by the lack of body hair when
it is the growth of it that is seen as a physical marker of a girl child’s
transition to that of a woman?
On the other hand, the absence of body hair is only natural in
prepubescent girls. Pedophilia’s iron grip influences these standards,
which is now so normalised we hardly bat an eyelash. This
normalisation of pedophilia is also prominently visible when Rue, in
her voiceover, says that Maddy lost her virginity at the age of 14 to a
man who was “like 40”. Rue adds, “Which in retrospect, seems kinda
rape-y and weird, but honestly, she was the one 'in control'. In seeking
to portray strong women characters with sexual agency, Euphoria
ignores the fundamental fact that no minor can be 'in control' in any
relationship with an adult.
Euphoria runs rampant in portraying a flimsy, “bad ass bitch” kind of
feminism that puts vulnerable teens amid pedophilia, child
pornography, and slut shaming. Adding to this mixture their
insecurities, trauma, and mental disorders, it stirs a concussion of pure
unadulterated triggering and problematic content that fails to
communicate its ideas safely to the targeted audience that remains
easily impressionable.
-Kasturi Dev Choudhury
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