‘Girls State’: Filmmakers suddenly had a Roe v Wade story on their hands
Bay Area filmmakers Amanda McBaine and Jesse Moss knew during the inception stage of “Boys State” that they would follow up their 2020 documentary — which centered on four young men participating in a weeklong American Legion leadership program that calls for forming a mock government — with an equivalent feature on the girls’ program.
What the married couple of two teen daughters couldn’t predict, however, was that “Girls State” and the seven young women it follows would get swept up in one of the biggest hot-button debates of current times.
The documentary begins streaming April 5 on Apple TV+.
McBaine and Moss and their teen subjects — Emily Whitmore, Maddie Rowan, Nisha Murali, Tochi Ihekona, Faith Glasgow, Cecilia Bartin and Brooke Taylor — gathered at Linden University in St. Louis, Missouri, in June 2022. A week later, leaked legal records disclosed that the Supreme Court had voted to strike down Roe v. Wade.
“We knew abortion was something that was going to be discussed,” McBaine recalls. “It always is at every Girls State and some Boys States too. But I think we couldn’t have known how emotional it was going to be for all these girls, particularly in Missouri, which has a trigger law (an abortion ban ready to go into effect should Roe v. Wade get quashed). So they knew the consequences of that overturn were going to be pretty momentous.”
The abortion debate takes center stage often in “Girls State” with the young women engaging in civil, intelligent discourse.
That openness to hear from someone on the other side of the issue differs from what McBaine and Moss mostly encountered when they ventured to Texas in June 2018 for “Boys State.”
“There’s a lot that’s different about what we filmed this time than last, partly because we’re four years further on in a polarized country,” McBaine explains. “And partly because female representation has never been what it should be.”
A question both filmmakers wanted to explore was whether the girls would essentially do politics differently.
“The boys were so tribal,” Moss recalls. “I think we did observe them (girls) to be more connecting with each other despite political differences, to be less tribal …and to be more willing to hear each other out.”
“It was really refreshing to be around,” McBaine adds.
Also refreshing was how many of the 17-year-olds continued a trend of not wanting to climb aboard one particular political party.
“It’s so interesting how many in this age group do not identify yet as a Democrat or Republican partly because they haven’t been forced to check a box on the ballot yet,” McBaine said. “So they really identify as independents, maybe even that’s a label – or they just a la carte their politics in really interesting ways. I love the freedom that they feel.”
What the girls did discover and then called out were the double standards between the Girls State and Boys State programs. Unlike the boys, girls are required to have a strict dress code and not go out by themselves at night. The boys also get gym and exercise time. The biggest discrepancy perhaps is that the funding for Boys State far outstrips the girls budget.
That comes to the fore due to the intrepid reporting of ambitious, self-acknowledged conservative teen Emily Whitmore, who was a candidate for governor in the American Legion program. She susses out that the girls program receives a third of funding that the boys’ does.
“I think Emily’s discovery is our discovery,” Moss said. “I’m shocked that the programs have different levels of funding. I shouldn’t be … . But to see Emily, a conservative girl who early in the film kind of dismisses these differences and says they hold women back but they’re sort of more imaginary than real, to actually confront them herself is I think one of the remarkable discoveries … that, wow, an unlikely conservative protagonist is the one who was a good reporter and who challenges the leadership in her program.”
McBaine and Moss commend the American Legion Alliance program for allowing them to film and say they are moving in the right direction to change institutional directions, including the dress codes, based on the feedback and efforts from the girls.
“They’re brave for inviting us in and I think they are moving into the 21st century,” Moss said. “You know we do that as a country uneasily too sometimes. It’s a process.”