Mean Girls was released in 2004 and was quickly embraced as a cult classic, especially by young women. The movie follows Cady, who has recently moved from Africa (country unspecified) and has to navigate the drama and politics of “girl world,” where mean girl Regina George and her friend group, “The Plastics,” control the high school social scene. Cady joins The Plastics as a spy for her new, unpopular friends Janis and Damian, but her loyalties and goals become muddled when she has a crush on Regina’s ex-boyfriend Aaron. Tina Fey wrote the chick flick, which was partially inspired by her own high school experiences.

Body image issues, especially relating to weight, are prevalent throughout Mean Girls. Disparaging comments about the appearance of women are common in the movie. One example of diet culture that stands out is how Cady weaponizes the fear of fatness against Regina as part of her plot to destroy Regina’s popularity. While there are many mentions of weight and body image throughout the movie, this specific subplot brings to light many of the stereotypes connected to anti-fatness and diet culture. 

In the cafeteria, Cady gives Regina “weight loss bars” which are actually Swedish Kalteen bars that her mother used to give children in Africa to help them gain weight (a plot point that is problematic for its own reasons). Cady deceptively gives her these bars in an attempt to rid Regina of her “hot body” by inducing her to gain weight non-consensually. This correlation between gaining weight and becoming unattractive is implied and never questioned. Regina immediately grabs the bar from Cady and stuffs it in her mouth. When Regina points out the packaging is in “Swedish or something,” Cady says the bars have an ingredient that is not legal in the US. Regina then names several weight-loss drugs that she’s memorized and asks if these are the illegal ingredient, but she still eats the bar when Cady says they are not. Regina mentions she wants to lose three pounds and waits expectantly until Gretchen and Karen assure her she is already skinny enough, to which her only response is “shut up.”

This scene is clearly supposed to be a mockery due to Regina’s obsession with weight loss. There is dramatic irony since the audience knows the bars are going to cause the opposite effect of what Regina wanted. The audience is laughing at Regina for being so eager to try this new weight-loss method, despite it being dangerous enough that the active ingredient is illegal in the US. The audience is also supposed to be making fun of Regina for being so obsessed with weight loss that she has memorized the names of common weight-loss drugs (ephedrine and phentermine, both of which can cause heart issues). While these moments are supposed to be funny, the thing that is being made fun of is not the beauty standards themselves; it is how fully the obsession with thinness controls young women. The movie frames Regina’s obsession with weight as stemming from her own vanity and shallowness, with little exploration of the outside pressures and standards that might be causing this harmful behavior. This view of disordered eating puts all blame on the individual and acts as if she is making these dangerous and foolish decisions in a vacuum. Unfortunately, Regina is not wrong in her belief that being skinny will benefit her. Fat people are given worse medical care, paid less, and treated worse overall than non-fat people in our thin-obsessed world. Regina’s beliefs are troubling, but not because they are unfounded, because of the damaging culture and realities that have led to these beliefs. Regina’s obsession is sad, but it is not uncommon, and trivializing the diet culture so many people fall victim to invalidates the real (and sometimes deadly) harm of fatphobia. Additionally, all the lead female characters throughout the movie are thin, so there is a level of removal from the most serious effects of fatphobia that allows the audience to laugh at Regina without considering the extremely harmful consequences that attitudes like hers have on actually fat people.

The end of the scene, where Regina stares at Karen and Gretchen until they tell her that she’s already skinny, enforces this idea that anyone would prefer being skinny over being fat, and it would be offensive to let someone think they are fat without correcting them. Regina considers telling someone they are not actually fat to be such a common courtesy that it means nothing to her, and she tells them to “shut up.” This idea strongly contrasts the body neutrality and Health At Every Size movements, which claim that body size is not necessarily a good thing or a bad thing, just a characteristic that varies among individuals. Karen and Gretchen’s comments also exemplify bonding around body image issues, which is a common practice for young women.

The idea that fatphobia is ingrained in the message of Mean Girls was confirmed for me near the end of the movie when Cady decides there is no use in being a mean girl because putting down others will not benefit her. In her internal dialogue, one of the examples that helps Cady come to this realization is that “calling someone fat doesn’t make you skinnier.” This is one of the most serious moments of the movie, and it clarifies that the writers of the movie consider it to be an unquestioned truth that anyone would prefer being skinny to being fat. Cady’s growth is realizing that you should not bully fat people because it is unkind and will not help you avoid the same fate, and not because there is nothing wrong with being fat in the first place. This moment enforces the idea that fatness is an inherently negative characteristic, so the kind thing to do is ignore someone’s fatness or pity them for it. While Cady thinks she’s being kind, this idea continues to stigmatize fatness. 

At the surface, Mean Girls seems to address body insecurity and diet culture. However, the movie makes fun of the results of these issues, and the young women who fall prey to them, without any discussion of where these beliefs come from. Representation like Mean Girls minimizes the dangers of diet culture and fatphobia.

Works Cited

Burgard, D. (2009). What is “health at every size”? In E. Rothblum & S. Solovay (Eds.), The fat studies reader (pp. 42–53). New York University Press.

Waters, M. (2004). Mean Girls [Film]. Lorne Michaels Productions.

Witter, B. (2020, May 19). Tina Fey used her real life as inspiration for the unforgettable characters in ‘mean girls’. Biography.com. Retrieved March 4, 2022, from https://www.biography.com/news/tina-fey-mean-girls-characters