Student Culture

[Wrath88]

Same as C.A., SG school life is rather repetitive. A few good memories, and a few bad, but overall nothing much to be recalled.

The culture up till now is more like groups of friends instead of what I'd consider actual cliques, some because they just stuck together then, others stuck together BEFORE then, and a few who just happen to click right.

[Haruka_Kitten]

Originally Posted by ChainLegacy

Doesn't that suck? I never envied girls, being big and strong wins you respect with essentially no work or stress (well, beyond the actual becoming strong factor, lol)...

True that, but I still have a large circle of friends. I don't need to have respect from popular people to feel socially adequate.

The muscles thing, though, definitely wins some respect from those people. I can't be bothered. I eat nothing at all, but I'm not fat, and I have some muscle, but not lots of it (remember, I chose to run after a bus, and despite actually getting to it, I lost because he was stupid enough not to open the door).

Respect doesn't necessarily win you friends, in fact, you can't win friends. You make friends.

[Kafriel]

The culture up till now is more like groups of friends instead of what I'd consider actual cliques, some because they just stuck together then, others stuck together BEFORE then, and a few who just happen to click right.

My group had a bit of everything

Respect doesn't necessarily win you friends, in fact, you can't win friends. You make friends.

True, but it does keep potential enemies from appearing~

About the girls thing, I think being straightforward solves the roundabout methods they might use and catch them off guard. About school in general: wish I could go back 8 years and relive it all, every day was just too much damn fun.

[RadiantBeam]

Originally Posted by ChainLegacy

Doesn't that suck? I never envied girls, being big and strong wins you respect with essentially no work or stress (well, beyond the actual becoming strong factor, lol). Having to do what you describe sounds miserable

I honestly wouldn't know. I preferred hanging out with boys during my high school years, they were much kinder and a lot easier to interact with than the girls. I had a few close friends who were girls, but never enough to get involved in the daily politics and interactions between the different groups. I just stayed out of it as best as I could.

[Kaijo]

Originally Posted by RadiantBeam

I honestly wouldn't know. I preferred hanging out with boys during my high school years, they were much kinder and a lot easier to interact with than the girls. I had a few close friends who were girls, but never enough to get involved in the daily politics and interactions between the different groups. I just stayed out of it as best as I could.

Different but same for me. I generally enjoyed hanging out with the girls from high school and beyond, as I saw them as kinder and gentler. Could just be how people react to their own gender, though. Guys are more apt to be nice to girls, and girls are more apt to not to be as caring to their own gender.

[yoropa]

Originally Posted by Kafriel

About school in general: wish I could go back 8 years and relive it all, every day was just too much damn fun.

I am so jealous that you are able to say that right now.

[Buttercup~]

Originally Posted by RadiantBeam

I honestly wouldn't know. I preferred hanging out with boys during my high school years, they were much kinder and a lot easier to interact with than the girls. I had a few close friends who were girls, but never enough to get involved in the daily politics and interactions between the different groups. I just stayed out of it as best as I could.

Agreed. Well actually that applies to me more now than in high school...
In high school I had a good mixed circle of friends...

Nowadays, I hang out with guys more often because they just always happen to be around =) Then again, I look to different groups to hang out with depending on my mood. Girls are more for comfort, advice giving and talks about the future/school, gossip, and we share more common interests (shopping!). But with guys, I find that I have a lot more fun and they're great for laughs... they can be good listeners but I find them more honest in opinions than girls too.

[Kafriel]

Originally Posted by yoropa

I am so jealous that you are able to say that right now.

Well, it wasn't ALL fun, it was actually pretty bad until I was...uh, 14 or so? Then I began to realize that one day I'll break away from everyone and be alone again, so ever since I had tried to live every day as happily as I could, which I did. I don't know if it was an ideal environment, or me growing up fast, or a combination of both, but I know that most of my classmates, if not all of them, don't feel the way I do.

[yoropa]

I'm still envious you got to do that.
Today I suffered yet another blow to my social status.
Why do I even try anymore?

[ChainLegacy]

You shouldn't, it's all useless bullshit not worth expending your energy on...

Originally Posted by Harufox

Respect doesn't necessarily win you friends, in fact, you can't win friends. You make friends.

No disagreement from me there. Personally I've always had the respect of most of my peers but only consider a small group of people to be my true friends.

[Kafriel]

Today I suffered yet another blow to my social status.
Why do I even try anymore?

I believe that logic can crush most forms of abuse while in school. To give an example of what I mean: a guy has a crush on a girl, and decides to play a "prank" on her by planting his cell phone in her bag and then calling in the middle of a course. That's so stupid that he deserved more than a mere suspension, not only were his actions totally irrational but he also hurt the girl a lot (what would you do/how would you feel if an unknown cell phone was ringing from your bag?). The most casual paper tossing can be resolved by simply speaking up, saying that it irritates you to no end and kills your focus, most kinds of abuse MUST be reported to the headmaster, on the grounds of having a negative effect to your own character growth as well as the perpetrator's, and should be dealt with immediately. The only kinds of violence that are hard to solve are the ones that, while not justified, are very hard for kids to resolve (for example a guy's dad hit another one's dog with his car, so the latter picked a fight at school).
If anyone says "you gonna tattle to the teachers again?" the most logical response would be "do you expect me to just let you do whatever you want?". Rules are meant to be followed after all, my headmaster ruled his school with an iron fist, so there was real trouble only once or twice. Teachers care a lot about students, even if they don't show it: their number one worry is your well-being, and if there's anything that makes you feel bad, you can still ask for their help. When I transferred schools back in elementary, I did complain to the teacher about being treated as an exile, and she picked two of my classmates to keep me company; knowing their characters and guessing a bit of mine, I could finally make friends.

[Yukinokesshou]

Originally Posted by Kafriel

I believe that logic can crush most forms of abuse while in school. To give an example of what I mean...

... Huh? Well, I understand what you mean, but I don't know where you're coming from. I can't work out how your post relates to Yoropa's situation: he/she did not say anything about abuse, violence, rules or tattling to teachers...

Please tell me if I'm stupid and failing to grasp an implied context which everyone else understands

Originally Posted by yoropa

Today I suffered yet another blow to my social status.
Why do I even try anymore?

What do you mean by "social status" and why do you care? Maybe I'm a bit thick, but the last two posts confuse me.

Social status, abuse and violence, teachers and rules... how do they all relate?? It all sounds a bit dark and shady. Did I somehow manage to escape a lot of crap that the average teenager experiences? On account of my personality, or perhaps the school I attended?

[Kafriel]

This being the student culture thread, I assume that Yoropa refers to his social status while in school.

I don't know where you're coming from.

A page or two ago we were discussing the sorts of groups that are created while in school, so since Yoropa mentioned a blow to his social status, I assume it related to one or more of said groups, which can be broken down to many types, which is why I generalized with abuse and gave examples of the two most common situations, i.e. pranks and violence.

Did I somehow manage to escape a lot of crap that the average teenager experiences? On account of my personality, or perhaps the school I attended?

Maybe you've forgotten about most of the bad stuff that might have happened to you, or maybe it just doesn't seem as important today. I've visited many schools from many different regions of my country, none of them had students in complete harmony with each other though...

[Yukinokesshou]

Originally Posted by Kafriel

maybe it just doesn't seem as important today.

That is quite likely. Also, I might have been the type of person who didn't care too much about what others thought of me. I never pondered the idea of cliques, so they could just as well not have existed for me.

When teachers kept going on and on about "peer pressure" during sex education and drug prevention week, I just thought "what the heck?? I don't feel any of this peer pressure thing"

However, there must have been a fair number of people like me at my school since I never felt completely "left out".

That was in high school though. The irony is that I do care about people's opinions now that I'm in university. To some extent, it's necessary for getting ahead in life: making connections, ensuring I have flatmates, securing references from professors, or even just having a "life" outside of studying and watching anime/drama.

[Kafriel]

I see university as a mock working place...there's dudes older than the professors, working with kids and everything, I can't even begin to relate to them. Most people work, so the theory courses are rather empty, and the professors either got trivial projects or ones too hard for my level. So, I'm just living it out. Don't get me wrong, it's fun and interesting at times, but I expect my real education to start at my actual working place, wherever that may be. Making friends is good, more like making colleagues; I tutor most of them in the courses I'm good at, they fill me in when I'm lacking experience. After we go our separate ways we can still ask each other for advice, so everybody wins

[JMvS]

Perhaps it could also have its place in the News thread, nonetheless here is something I just found:

Princess Aiko "bullied at school".

Conclusion, even being of royal (and semi-divine) status won't help you much when put together with ordinary kids.

Guess special tutoring with chosen peers existed for a reason.

[RadiantBeam]

Originally Posted by yoropa

I'm still envious you got to do that.
Today I suffered yet another blow to my social status.
Why do I even try anymore?

Honestly, I think you're better off not trying so hard with your social status. I didn't bother with it much at all in high school, and by my senior year I was well liked, respected, and had a close circle of friends. Sometimes it's just easier in the long run to go with the flow and be yourself.

[hinakatbklyn]

Social status...... PUblic high schools, forget social status. You try and survive public high schools here. Even back in my days (early 90's) the usual bullies and all that. The gun violence or gang violence was past my school days so I lucked out there. (only stayed 2 out of 4 years)

The other 2 years in private high school, I fared much better. Not a big school, so it was like almost everyone knew your name. I didn't try to push the issue with making friends, they ended up coming to me.

[MeoTwister5]

High school social status means almost absolutely nothing after those 3-4 years. Everyone's practically a blank slate socially once you enter college/workforce where those artificial social restrictions in high school are nearly non-existent. If in case your high school social life sucks then it may be best to ride it out, because after that you have a chance to start again with less restraints.

[yoropa]

Going to bump this since I got a problem.

I'm a senior, graduating soon. All my social interactions have degenerated and I'm not even sure why. It started with one girl who has treating me like crap for the past two years because she would immediately ignore anything I say to talk only about stuff she wants to talk about. I called her "the biggest retard I've ever met" and that apparently greatly offended her. She took it to a different friend of hers, also one of mine, who then later started getting angry at me and now refuses to talk to me unless she wants to make some snide comment against me (though those have stopped because when it comes to debates like that I win, always)

Later a different one of my friends, one I've known since 5th grade, also part of this group, started to get angry at me and treat me like a lesser person. At this point, there are 6 people left in our little clique thing. One of those 6 has forever hated me and I'm not too sure why since I was the one who introduced him to the clique back in 7th grade. So now we're down to 5. One of those 5, another I've known since 5th grade, teams up with the original girl I insulted and then turned against me as well.

Down to 4. One of these 4 has always been pretty angsty and moody, but she is strongly against the girl I initially insulted so chances are if she heard about what happened, she'd probably be on my side. The problem is she is so angsty that it's impossible to have a conversation with her so I've never been able really to call her a friend, more a friendly acquaintance.

Down to 3. One of these guys I've helped a lot in my life. I'm the sole reason he has able to get through his video game design study (which he was doing for credit) and end strongly. He's told me multiple times before that he views me as the wisest of his friends and always able to solve problems. The other day I went up to him to ask a simple question, "Have you seen [insert person]?" And he fumes against me, completely unrelated to my question, in a very irritated, angry tone, and later continues to be angry against me.

Down to 2. Of these was the guy I considered my strongest friend. I've known him since 6th grade. Today in Biology things fell apart. I was getting somewhat queasy over the anatomy diagrams we were looking at in class. I'm just that type of guy. So I try to slightly cover them with my hand or a paper whenever I didn't need to look at them. Apparently that greatly insulted him. He thrashed out against me with all sorts of insults I did not expect to hear whatsoever. Completely uncalled for. He used to date the girl I insulted previously, and although they broke up chances are they might get back together by the end of the year.

So now it's down to one guy who everybody hates except for a few select people myself included. And I don't know if this one can last the 59 days remaining until graduation, especially considering how this one wasn't that strong to begin with.

In the school he'd be the last person I would consider a friend. I turned to the freshmen class to see if anything new can arise and I found one guy who probably would end up being the only freshmen I will keep contact with once I graduate. Outside this I have one guy who graduated, but he is very bad at keeping contact so although we're all fine and dandy I doubt that can amount to much. There's also one girl outside of school I recently met and we've been getting along surprisingly well, and I say that with surprise since I'm terrible at social stuff if you couldn't have guessed from all the shit that recently happened.

And finally the one girl I've been greatly crushing over but chances are I'll find some way to fuck that one up too. Fucking shit. I need some serious help right now. My mind is saying just wait until college and make do with what I got but I still have to deal with this crap in school everyday until then. And even in college chances are I'm going to have this exact same problem.

tl;dr; I'm fucked.

What's a good way to come off as being friendly and not scary while trying to meet new people? Apparently I'm a really frightening person to deal with.