The New York Times reports that Brooke Yalof, 12, and Simone Rivera, 13, go to Spence--"the Bergdorf Goodman of Upper East Side private schools," according to the paper.
     Desiree Kennedy-Mitton, 16, used to attend the Hewitt School, also on Manhattan's Upper East Side--perhaps the Barney's of U.E.S. private schools?    
    Isabelle Edmonds, 13, is another Bergdorf-Goodman--I mean, Spence--student. So is Charlotte Levy, 13. Olivia Salman, 12, attends the Trinity School on the Upper West Side, which, apparently doesn't  rate a retail comparison in Timesworld.
     All of these girls, however, came together ("at the Yalofs' uptown duplex") to watch the pilot of a rancid new show on the CW network called "Gossip Girl" about the mindless sexcapades of deeply spoiled teens. We should all thank the New York Times: The girls' reactions to the show,  and what they reveal about the berserk sex-and-style-obsessed schools they go to, should make the 99 percent of the human race who can't afford the insanely high tuitions of these supposedly elite schools thank our lucky stars. At least we're not paying through the nose ($28,000 at Spence) to have our kids contaminated. 
    What's the show about? The Times ticks off some of the major "plot" points: Boys in blazers smoke marijuana and talk about sampling their father's Viagra.  The "sullied" heroine "downs martinis like raspberry Snapple  and engages in smoldering sex-capades" with her best friend's date ("the two soaked in Champagne and tearing at each other's clothes"). You get the idea. We all get the idea. And it stinks, besmirching (an old-fashioned word for you) all those who are exposed to it--especially when they happen to be in 7th grade.
    Not that these young flowers of American privilege blush.  Projecting  a sometimes gigglesome ennui, they explain to the newspaper how closely the show tracks their little world.
    You can read the details here--and you should, if only to be prepared to put the kibosh on "Gossip Girl" in your own house. Of course, the story leaves some of the most important questions unasked. As in: What posessed the parents of these children 1) to raise their youngsters to become smut consumers? and 2) to make them available to a newspaper to go on the record as consumers of such trash?