Modern day cheerleading is an extension of gymnastics, due to facts that many smaller schools cannot afford to support many athletic programs. Airheads get cut from more competitive sports teams for lacking discipline and proper study. The main exception I saw was in basketball, where airheads sometimes don't get cut, because it's very hard to replace size and strength (watch a coach's frustration from micromanaging a tall dumb guy). Aside from that, there are non-competitive environments in high school where almost anyone may be on a team. I know for example, my high school cross-country team had an overweight walker who was trying to get in better shape. In the same way, girls join high school cheerleading for practical reasons (increased visability), and yet any discerning person would recognize that high school is not fully representative of real athletics.
Aside from that, I also don't think you are capable of seeing through instances of the common 'airhead cheerleader' fascade. Girls still pretend to be dumber than they are; boy are far more likely to be demonstrating their peak intelligence capacity (although not all people fit these stereotypes). It equalizes a bit more as both sexes mature, although in many cases people do not mature. That's also a key trait about airheads; they are typically stuck in the mentality of the place they were last 'schooled', and unable to move beyond it. Airheads think life is still high school or college, depending on when they stopped maturing. But even worse, airheads believe that life is only 'their version' of high school or college, and that there isn't a real world out there where things are different.
Most airheads are unquestioning media consumers, and are actively trying to appear smarter than they are. Women are more typically branded as airheads for hazardous 'fashion' consumption, which is denying part of the reality that good looks help people climb career ladders. But in regards to media consumption, massive air pockets that replace brain tissue are conducive to unimpeded data flow that moves in the ears and out the mouth. So what comes in, is exactly what comes out. The common ground between airheads is that an outside source does the thinking for them, so it's possible that future airheads will predominantly come from internet sources as well; and yet these airheads will think of themselves as 'nerds' due to the quantity of information they have access to. And when an airhead tries to think for his/herself; I think we've all seen the Miss Teen South Carolina video by now.
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