Why are we shocked about Club 21 when it simply echoes popular culture?

A story broke today about about a Queensland Catholic school with student club called Club 21 where membership is dependent on being one of the cool, good-looking chicks.

According to the Herald Sun web site:Year 11 girls from the co-educational St Patrick’s College in the central Queensland city of Mackay are ranked according to looks, weight and their popularity with boys.
Members of the elite club, dubbed “Club 21″ or “Big 21″, parade their ranking from one to 21 on their wrists.
The skinnier and prettier the girl, the higher her rank.
One respondent to an internet forum on the issue said: “Ugly girls need not apply.”

The school’s principal has rightly defended his students to the ever judgemental talk-back media saying “‘in’ groups and ‘cool’ groups had always existed in schools”.

Girls have always had cliques and hierarchies and this as shown in every second teen movie and TV show such as Sleepover Club,  St Trinians, Hairspray, Lizzie McGuire, Clueless, Heathers, Hannah Montana and of course Mean Girls  - it’s worth noting that in most of these it’s the so-called ordinary girls who come out winners.

If anything the outrage at Club 21 is patronising towards those who are supposedly not pretty enough (yet) to qualify in that it seems to endorse the view that looks are the most important thing for a girl to have.  Would there be outrage against a club for smart, sporty or emo kids only?

I bet Club 21 is despised by more girls than it is envied. As one student wrote on an internet forum: ”They are a group of year 11 girls at St Pats who think they are top but really pathetic sociopathic sluts.”