BFC Q1) A critical theorist would argue that the characters in the Breakfast Club are the perfect example of 1) how SES can impact one’s attitude about education, 2) how SES impacts the way schools order themselves socially (hierarchies), and 3) how SES impacts the ways students treat one another. Choose at least one character and make a case either for or against this theoretical perspective (agree/disagree).

I agree with the perspective of how the characters in the movie “The Breakfast Club” are a great example of how socio-economic status impacts education. First off, looking at Claire and Brian you can tell how social status affects the students’ attitudes about education. Claire has rich parents and she gets everything she wants and even got detention for ditching school to go shopping. This shows that she really doesn’t value her education as she is at the top of the social hierarchy. Brian on the other hand is towards the bottom of the hierarchy and although his parents force him to get A’s you can still tell that he appreciates his education more since he’s in many academic clubs as well. Second, SES impacts the way schools order themselves. Claire and Andrew are a good example because they are both at the top of the social hierarchy and they start talking to each other right away in detention. They kind of try to ignore everyone else because they are far below them. Finally, SES impacts the way the students treat each other and Bender is a good example of this. He is probably the lowest on the social hierarchy being the criminal type and he treats the prep, Claire, and the jock, Andrew, disrespectfully. He also tries to get to Claire’s level and get in her head by sexually harassing her and she doesn’t like it. The students argue throughout the movie because they are so different both by social status and because of their family lives. They all have extremely different home lives but they still all find a way to hate their parents either way. So even though socio-economic status impacts the way students treat each other and view each other the movie shows that even different people can still be friends in the end.