I’m sure we all remember the episode of South Park when Eric made the “gingers have no souls” presentation. It was an ongoing phenomenon for a while around the time when I was in middle school, which, too absolutely no one, is also known as “the glory days.” This, for me, was especially not the case. I didn’t really understand why people in the hallways and in my classes would tell me I have no soul, because at the time I had never been graced with the privilege of watching an episode of South Park. Poor, deprived little ginger me. I would get mocked for having red hair, pale skin and freckles all because of a 2-foot animated boy. I never saw that coming!

If this ridiculous episode had been released in present day I would definitely be laughing along with the rest of the crowd, while enjoying these crazy allegations and probably even making fun of myself as well. But I got a little unlucky with the timing. It was released during a time of my life when I was an awkward and self-conscious middle schooler, so the last thing I needed was to be picked on about my natural looks. I distinctly remember begging my mom to let me dye my hair blonde or brown so that my peers would stop making fun of me, telling me I have no soul, and saying they couldn’t ask me to the school dance because I was a “ginger.” Sad stuff right? It sucked to be picked on for something that didn’t even make sense. “Gingervitis” is what Eric calls it on South Park. It’s the condition that us gingers supposedly have, that makes our hair red and our faces so pale. He even compares us to vampires.

Looking back on it now makes me chuckle, and also grateful that my mom never let me go through with dying my naturally beautiful hair. I hate to sound cocky, but I do believe my hair is fabulous, and I wouldn’t trade it for anything. So yes, it was not any fun being made fun of during my middle school days, but it did force me to grow a back bone. It taught me to drown out those people who fed on making others feel bad about themselves. I’ve learned to love the show South Park, and I applaud them for mocking every type of person there is out there in such unusually clever ways. Hopefully you all don’t take away from this that I was traumatized from that ginger episode, because that’s not it at all. I look back on that time as an era in my life when I had to finally embrace my innate looks and learn to let others be hard on me. And in the end, I am completely fine with having no soul, just as long as I get to keep my bright red hair and creamy, yet easily burned, white skin.