Dear Saffron

A survey commissioned by Coca-Cola has found that teenagers' favourite role model is Edina's daughter in `Absolutely Fabulous'. A sixth-former explains

Our generation has chosen you as a role model, discarding Liz Hurley, Kate Moss and the image of the stereotypical teenager symbolised by the obnoxious Treasure. We've grown tired of being labelled the Pop- Tart-eating, MTV-watching generation, watched over by angst-ridden parents praying that we survive adolescence.

The fact that you have become popular shows how ambitious we've become. Girls are not willing to be left behind in the drive for success. Like you, we are achieving it in exam results rather than trying to bluff our way into the fashion industry (like Edina) on the strength of a claim to be fashionable.

You are in control of your own life. Ignoring your fashion-crazed mother and her drugged friend, you concentrate on educating yourself. Not only are you up to date on politics and environmental issues (witness your reaction to Edina's claim that plastic "pop-specs" are "kind to trees" because "they're not made out of wood"), you are also extremely practical. In a recent episode, you arranged for the kitchen (burnt down by Patsy after an accident with a cigarette) to be redecorated in a day. Meanwhile, your mother spends the day looking for a door handle, which she eventually finds and photographs in New York, neglecting to do any work as usual.

It's possible that every generation wants to rebel against its parents. If this is the case, you have a hard task. As the daughter of a fully paid-up member of the flower power generation, you rebel by being a true Nineties child. We've grown up faster than our parents because of the dismal situation this country has got itself into. We have to take care of ourselves because it is increasingly unlikely anyone else will. As a result, we take ourselves seriously. In an age when anorexia and drugs are presented as fashionable, we need to be sensible just to stay alive.

There is of course also the point that although you may seem eminently sensible in contrast to Edina and Patsy, there's more to you than that. Despite your sensible clothes, "unfloppy" hair and glasses you are actually very attractive, only needing the right leading man to remove the glasses and say "gee, you're beautiful" to discard the "straight" image. There is the occasional suggestion that you are not quite as good as you seem. (Who remembers the honey and yoghurt incident in Morocco?) You can have fun without resorting to the excesses of Edina and Patsy who can't remember how to go to sleep because they've become so used to passing out every night.

The essence of Saffron is control. The fact that we have chosen you as a role model shows how important that is to us. No one wants to be ignored and our generation has been dismissed too often. You exemplify the rejection of fads and crazes and the need to gain some real power over our own lives and the things that affect us.