Reality: An Essay

school, school, school.

   I show a decent amount of intelligence at times. I can use complex and advanced words in a day-to-day basis. I can add in my head, not on my fingers. I show a basic amount of knowledge in history, like the classics and certain events in time. I'm up to date on current events and can discuss it with peers.
    It doesn't matter.
    Even though teacher's drill the basic 'be who you want to be' mantra into my head daily, school society is still one mass of conforming thought bubbles. We listen to what we should, we read at a 6th grade level, and our vocabulary is littered with what we need to know: how to say sex in ten different ways, a variety of colorful curse words, and every insult we could possibly use to hurt someone; all there in our mind.
   If you don't know these things, it's Hell. Maybe not the "cliques" teasing that we see in falsely portrayed school movies. It's not upfront snide comments about clothing choices with a parade of giggles afterwards. If you're ugly, it's not as big of a deal as you might think. It's the difference that makes you stand out. If you're not part of the conforming mass, you might as well be a target. I'm a straight, white, female. I'm perfectly fine.  Safe.
   What about those who aren't?
   What about the Mexican guy who's getting straight-A's, but still has to put up with students assuming he carries a knife everywhere and is part of a gang? What about the homosexual girl who isn't allowed to join the school's volleyball team because the rest of the girls voted her out, saying it would be "too creepy"? What about the straight male who just likes to wear makeup, but gets called a f*g and beaten up regularly?
  Being who we want to be is a terrifying thought.
  Standing up for those who are themselves is even more stomach dropping.
  This isn't some movie where the whole school joins together against "the bullies".
  Especially when the whole school is the bully, whether they mean to or not.
  Everyone has the prejudice.
  Even the most intelligent of us.

Author's Note

Another essay, another hour wasted in school.

Reviews

[Bella-Marie]

Oh my goodness. What a great great essay. If I wrote this my teacher would put me top of the class, LOL.
I liked all the different examples and what really made me gasp was the tone you wrote it in. It managed to be down-to-eath, kindly and sensitive to others. Well done.

[roarke]

hmm, I wouldn't say wasted. I'm always impressed with your grasp of scope whether writing a tight short story or an essay like this.

The old know what the young search for. When you finally reach that stage you are going to be thankful you learned about more than what you single minded-ly searched for in the first place.

All humans have a need to belong. It can mean belonging to a concept or belief as much as belonging to a clique or group. Unfortunately the scope of this belonging is narrowed by prejudices. That's one of the hard elements to learn on your journey to growing old.

the world, the universe, LIFE, is more than what you first experience. That's the redundant part. Learning something more from those first experiences, those first beliefs, those first prejudices, and choosing to create something more, moving forward, that's the finer knowledge. Embrace it.

Ya didn't waste no hour youngin'
lol.