“The problem I have with mewing in the classroom and at school is that kids are using it as a way to be disrespectful to their teachers, without their teachers understanding what it is they’re doing and why they’re doing it.”
Teresa explains that the nonverbal gesture doesn’t really signify anything specific unless you know exactly what it means and why someone’s doing it.
While she acknowledges that kids are mewing at each other as well, she’s seeing the trend most commonly directed towards unknowing teachers or adults in the room.
Mewing at Teachers
“Of course the kids think it’s funny because the adult in the room doesn’t understand, they look clueless, it makes them look stupid, it makes them look out of the loop,” she says, “but it’s also a power play on the part of the kid.”
Teresa says the nonverbal response is a way for the child to not have to respond or take accountability for things that are being asked of them. Instead, kids are simply just responding with silence and a nonverbal gesture that dismisses the teacher altogether, then gets a laugh out of the rest of the class.
Think of the old slang, “talk to the hand, not to the face.” That’s essentially what the mewing trend is.”Can’t talk now, working on my jawline.”
“The teacher really can’t respond in a way that’s helpful or useful because if they try to get them in trouble or they try to question the gesture…that’s going to stop the gesture from happening again,” she explains. “There’s no way to really prove that the gesture in and of itself is disrespectful or harmful.”
“The trend is also fueled by social media,” she says, “and every kid in th room that sees somebody do the mewing gesture to a teacher is going to find it funny.”
“They’re going to respond in a way that encourages them to do it over and over again.”
Teresa says it’s so easy for kids to play it off as a joke and dismiss the whole action as “not that big of a deal,” but, she argues, for teachers it is a big deal because it completely undermines the hard work they’re doing to engage their students.
“It’s really disruptive to the work environment as well,” she says.
