High school tyrants.
From “Heathers” to “Clueless” to “Mean Girls”, we’ve seen that “snotty clique” theme repeat. And we love these Hollywood narratives for their half-truths and hyperbolic representations. Because suffering and teen angst – much like the prospect of death – is always so much easier to bear when we make a parody of it for our own entertainment. LiLo’s flick, for instance, came out in 2004 – when I was a couple years out of high school and could laugh retrospectively at just how true some of the stuff was and simply revel in the ridiculousness of the rest. But that probably because I was in college by then, time had passed, and – to my shame – I probably would have been sitting at Regina’s table during that era of my life as some Gretch-Karen chimera character. But what about those who are still in high school and feeling more of the cold sting of rejection? And less of the Hollywood lulz?
What makes these cliques form and morph into the less-funny IRL dramas of bullying, humiliation, and suicide? And can it be changed? Research done recently aimed to observe what makes cliques tick, has thus far made an interesting analysis. One that kinda raised my eyebrows. Larger schools, they say, tend to correlate more with these sorts of cruel groups. It was shown that institutions with more elective courses and academic freedom bred more of these than the smaller schools whose groups were based on common interests and the same activities.
I dunno.
I feel like, while that may not be a false assessment, it’s misleading.
Yeah, larger schools are going to have more cliques. There are more people. So, there are gonna be more cliques. Duh. And – as for the smaller schools – there may be fewer cliques, but it’s like the shade throwing and general malevolence gets condensed down into what bit of the population there is. I’m going to attempt an analogy (that although it took place in college, not high school, I feel like it parallels at least a bit). My first two years of college at a Jesuit University were a good example. Sure it wasn’t high school – but it felt like one – a religious one – with dorms. It was a small school, and despite the independence of being out on your own, there was still that air of snobbery ensuing within those tiny classrooms – mostly coming from the sorority sort. The judgmental glances. The giggles at the emo girl when she got up to speak.
It all felt so familiar, I almost started wondering if my boyfriend in fifth period wanted to ditch sixth and seventh, sneak past security, and go make out somewhere. Right before realizing, oh right. No fifth period. This is college. We’re meant to act like grown ups. We just aren’t, apparently. Contrarily, when I got to supersized Virginia Tech, the sororities and fraternities were still a thing and they were still snotty – but not as much. It was more like a “I’m know I’m better than you, but I also know better than to throw shade because it isn’t cute so I’ll pretend to be nice.”
I don’t know how far this college analogy reaches into high school – but I imagine that if you have kids with freedom in both cases who choose the prison-within-a-prison of living under fabricated social constructs (within the even larger one of society), it’s gotta be even worse as a teen. Because you’re still living under the rule of parents and teachers and can’t leave if you like. So time and space for distractions from the pain of pariah life is either limited or nonexistent. And hunting down like-minded groups is like fishing near Fukushima – especially in a smaller school. Sure, you don’t have a clique. But it’s something far worse. You don’t have anything. You’re alone. With no escape. Because that’s your day to day reality for as many hours as most professionals work – like your parents who put you there and don’t have time or energy to care about how it’s emotionally destroying you by the time they’re done sitting in carbon monoxide fume infused traffic.
I imagine it’s similar but even worse in smaller high schools. Because in college, however small and snotty, there’s still the fact around hateful classmates of “At least I don’t have to see this C-U-Next-Tuesday until next Tuesday… at 9 A.M.”. Contrarily, the reigning emotional parasites that are the stereotypical high school “mean girls” (or douchey dudes), know they harbor that power over the peons. And – since the student population’s so small – they know they’ll see ‘em again in the hallway, lunch, lav, whatever. And if you’re that peon, there ain’t shiz you can do but wait. For the day to end. For high school to end. For the acceptance letter to come.
So, sure – maybe there are fewer cliques in small institutions.
But, when you think about it, the effect of that is actually worse than if there were.
But don’t lose hope.
High school Hitler may not get hit by a bus, but you’ll be alright if you stay the course.
‘cause like a wise brown teenage character in a silver screen story once said:
“Don’t let the haters stop you from doin ya thang.”