Cliques in our youth

[steve-in-kville]

I had some time to ponder this a bit....

When I was in school (both middle school & high school), clothes and fashion were huge. The "cool kids" had the right jeans and shoes. My parents did well and never caved and bought me such high dollar items (which in hindsight was good).

Therefore, I was never part of the cool cliques, yet I had my small circle of friends, most of which lived on farms, rode dirt bikes, built go-carts, shot guns and made small explosives to shove down groundhog holes (story for another day). We weren't full on nerds but we weren't "preps" as we called them back then.

I think that did me a lot of good as I learned it was okay to be the lone wolf, or black sheep, and march to the beat of my own drum. To this day, I still don't have a lot of friends and that is fine. I really don't care if someone likes me or not, it is not my problem. This has also given me the ability to think for myself and come to my own conclusions, especially in religion, politics and what I see as black and white.

Sorry so lengthy.

[gracefortoday]

I had some time to ponder this a bit....

When I was in school (both middle school & high school), clothes and fashion were huge. The "cool kids" had the right jeans and shoes. My parents did well and never caved and bought me such high dollar items (which in hindsight was good).

Therefore, I was never part of the cool cliques, yet I had my small circle of friends, most of which lived on farms, rode dirt bikes, built go-carts, shot guns and made small explosives to shove down groundhog holes (story for another day). We weren't full on nerds but we weren't "preps" as we called them back then.

I think that did me a lot of good as I learned it was okay to be the lone wolf, or black sheep, and march to the beat of my own drum. To this day, I still don't have a lot of friends and that is fine. I really don't care if someone likes me or not, it is not my problem. This has also given me the ability to think for myself and come to my own conclusions, especially in religion, politics and what I see as black and white.

Sorry so lengthy.

This is so interesting because I feel the same way. I'm so glad that I can think on my own and don't need someone else to validate who I am and tell me what to think. I think there's freedom in being your own person and not caring what anyone thinks of you.

I have a feeling the clique I'm talking about is very insecure. And I have a feeling the parents play into it BIG time. Just my opinion from the outside looking in and not really knowing any of the clique that well. I think it's experience from many years of observing this type of stuff.

[steve-in-kville]

I have a feeling the clique I'm talking about is very insecure. And I have a feeling the parents play into it BIG time. Just my opinion from the outside looking in and not really knowing any of the clique that well. I think it's experience from many years of observing this type of stuff.

I went to public school. My wife was some public, parochial mennonite school and later home schooled. Our children started out in a mennonite school but the last half attend public school now.

It is of my observation that the mennonite schools are way worse than public schools in the "cliquishness". And guess where they get it from? Josh nailed it a few posts back.

[Ken]

I have a feeling the clique I'm talking about is very insecure. And I have a feeling the parents play into it BIG time. Just my opinion from the outside looking in and not really knowing any of the clique that well. I think it's experience from many years of observing this type of stuff.

I went to public school. My wife was some public, parochial mennonite school and later home schooled. Our children started out in a mennonite school but the last half attend public school now.

It is of my observation that the mennonite schools are way worse than public schools in the "cliquishness". And guess where they get it from? Josh nailed it a few posts back.

None of this is anything new. My dad's stories of growing up in Mennonite schools in the 1950s sound exactly the same.

There is a certain "superiority complex" in some Mennonite circles that I think kids pick up on in unproductive ways. Both within the church and in how they relate to outsiders. It is also nothing unique to Mennonites. In the public school where I teach I see the same thing with groups of Mormon kids and Apostolic Lutheran kids who are the two most visible clique groups around here. Back in Texas it was the Southern Baptists who made the big school cliques. BOTH students and teachers/administrators actually.