I seem to recall my dad saying to me that “school days are the best days of your lives”. From the perspective of having zero responsibility, well adult responsibilities anyways I suppose it was good. However the sheer cataclysm of emotions of entering adulthood as well as the suffocation of homework was actually not missed at all. But most importantly its the social construct of school in general which is why I can’t say my best experiences were from school. I wouldn’t say I was bullied per se, but its the ridiculous hierarchy which manifests within the classroom which is what I want to talk about.

I wasn’t one of the popular kids at all, in fact for the majority of my school life I was a ghost. Not one of the “cool” kids, you know the ones who everybody liked because not doing so would render you an outcast, and I guess my reluctance to adhere to the conventional almost “hero worship” of the proverbial “in-crowd” makes me sick. Call me a communist but what makes them better than me? The fact that they’re more likely to not do their homework or mouth off the teacher who can’t control a class make them better to associate with? Personally I disagree with that notion entirely.

Sporty kids at school: usually the biggest pricks you had a class with

It’s a critical look at elitism is what I’m trying to say at the rotten core of these stuck up people and I think the main criterion of popular kids derives from the fact that they’re in the sports teams, which somehow by default makes you superior, and thus the God-given right to ridicule people minding your own business, such as myself as a school boy. Does that make you a better person? Well by my book that doesn’t make you some kind of hero, that makes you a c*nt. My school was no different, all the kids who were good at sport (probably because their parents made them, thus giving them no time to actually socialise properly) seemed to be the biggest c*nts of them all. Worst of all they’ve probably got their own kids now creating another generation of kids just like them. Does the fact that you are overly-competitive and elitist make you a better person? Well no, not at all. But the “jocks” as they’re colloquially named, are not totally to blame. It’s the teachers, who used to be jocks, who in turn groom another generation of jocks to be just as odious and sporting more testosterone supported inflated opinions of themselves.

I think it’s an insecurity thing on their part because you feel better about yourself by putting others down, which in essence is cowardly and callow, but I have distinct memories of a kid I went to school with, who was quite sporty, but also was an arrogant c*nt. He was short, proper short, but thought he knew everything and thought everyone should try to keep him onside. I also distinctly kicking his ass at badminton, quite strange seeing that he was captain sporty and I was just the quiet goth geek who no one really paid attention to. The backlash from that was accompanied by the post match verbals which just goes to show how bad a loser someone like that could be. I sincerely hope he has failed at life.

I think the gist of what I’m trying to say is that karma totally doesn’t work. So many people who were c*nts at school probably still are but since the general cosmic law of come-uppance doesn’t exist, their persecution of adolescents just learning to be themselves never ever caught up with them. I’m glad I never was one of the “popular” kids, because I’d be life of inertia, perpetually trying to prove I’m better than everyone else. I think society is to blame as much for it as the school is, even if my school blindly promoted elitism leaving average people such as myself on the sidelines, in favour of arrogant kids. So while society is inherently to blame, it is also the responsibility of the school to ensure that every pupil is treated equally, which is not the case at all, certainly with my old school. Stereotypes exist and I suppose I would be in the geek mould, and now on reflection I wouldn’t have it any other way.

 I spent my evenings as a 16 year old playing Playstation and Games Workshop, at least it was better than pretending to get drunk and get chlamidya, and subsequently grow up to be a royal prick! I’m glad I am this way instead of coming out of the school system as a conceited tosspot with a superiority complex.