One word, lady: desperation. When you’ve got nothing to lose, sometimes you’ll do anything to change it. That’s why I confessed to a suicide attempt in 11th grade social studies. In my case, it failed. Things actually got worse. I’m glad it worked for Guinastasia.
CJ
I generaly agree with most the comments made on my earlier post. It is a shame schools aren’t set up well to benifit kids with good education or good life skills. It seems the fault is more with the school than with any particular activity designed to make school more fun like the twin idea.
It seems rather than complain about such days, we as interested adults should instead ask the teacher/school that holds such events “What will you be doing to help those children who don’t fit in and don’t enjoy such events?”
This would highlight the actual problems that exist in school life, rather than saying “Don’t do this as it may upset some kids” which is merely a negative response.
You and a friend dress alike, or you don’t. What’s so awkward about that choice?
It’s probably your perky tits.
This thread is giving me fond memories of 1999. Remember that? When a couple of morons shot up a school? “Experts” on the situation pointed out that it can be the weird, anti-social kids that get frustrated and act out in violent ways. All of a sudden these kids were not just the butt of jokes, but were actively targetted as being violent psychotics. Kids who were already marginalized were now being suspended for wearing the wrong kind of jacket, or for expressing anything other than knee-jerk horror at what the morons did.
Good times!
Or you wear your uniform, proudly displaying that you have no freinds.
I am absolutely not overreacting.
When I was in elementry school, I was designated “the cootie girl.” This meant that everybody would run screaming from me. Everyday activities, like lining up for class or buying lunch, would be accompanied by a chorus of screams and the occasional person trying to touch me on a dare. This persisted for years. In middle school the charming name “herpes girl” was applied to me and kids took to throwing small rocks at me during PE. Imagine the effect the name “herpes girl” has one someone who is just going through their sexual awakening and dreaming of the prince on a white horse they KNOW will never come since every guy they know thinks she is a disease. The teachers knew about this, but did nothing to stop it. Needless to say, I grew up a depressed kid. It’s taken years to start to deal with the depression and learn that I am likeable and that my friends do like me.
I am not a different person than when I was a kid. Just like we do not expect adults to weather total public humiliation daily, we should not expect that for kids. Kids don’t have some magic lower breaking point or ability to ward off scars. Now, this stuff is going to happen, sure, but that doesn’t mean that our teachers should not only allow it but actually create situations that encourage it.
While I may not be invited to all the after-work parties or whatever, at my workplace during work hours I am judged by my work. The management focuses on work, not on creating wierd scenerios like “Line up in order of percieved attractiveness day” or “Point to the person you’d like to sleep with and then the person you wish would get fired” day. The managment would, however, get involved if co-workers started publically discussing what they thought my STD status was, running and screaming every time I got near, or throwing rocks at me as I left each day.
It’s not about having one friend, it’s about having one friend who is willing to publically and exclusively associate with you. I always had friends, but when forced to choose sides, they would always use that chance to better their social status by trying to get “in” with more popular kids. These situations always let me know just how expandable I was to my “friends”.
Not participating means you will be one of the few in a uniform, which publicly brands you a friendless loser. It’s one thing to expose kids to a situation that will surely lead some of them to shame and humiliation. It’s another to make them wear that shame and humiliation publicly all day long.
If it’s true that more than half of the students fail to participate, then it’s not such a big deal. Chances are I wouldn’t participate. I would have though that dressing up just like my bestest male friend would be–and forgive the term–totally gay.
Well, I did agree that limiting it to 2 kids was stupid, and that I would tell my kid to go ahead and dress as a group. I realize that my examples are a little different, but there are times in school and life when people pair up, and also when kids are going to feel bad or feel left out when that is not the intention. Sometimes some kids are going to feel left out, and while we don’t need to intentionally create those situations, we also don’t need to eliminate all events where kids are having fun that involves pairing off. I would just place twin day on one side of that line and others would put it on the ‘intentionally making kids feel bad’ side I guess.
I also would not compare twin day to ‘merciless harassment’ though. Honestly, I do understand that some kids have a rough time in school and teachers should do what they can to prevent that. IF someone does not come to school dressed as a twin AND he gets teased / harassed for it then they should take action and kids should get punished for it. As others have pointed out, however, kids hardly need a twin day to find a reason to make fun. Ultimately the goal is to have kids who are kind to each other, having a twin day or not does not make a difference to that end.
It is just a fun thing for kids to dress like each other. If a child already feels terrible about themselves and has no friends, not having twin day is not going to help that child feel better about themselves. Let’s look at the real problem and not prohibit schools from having fun events. If we got rid of every event where kids might find a reason to make fun of others or someone might feel left out, we wouldn’t be able to do anything.
Probably because you’re not an asshole. That’s always a plus. 
Which, of course, probably creates a lack of trust. Certainly very understandable.
Actually, Velma, most of my post was directed at Bippy. I appologize for not making that clear.
Siege, I think it worked because in my case, I hadn’t ALWAYS been picked on-other years, I was friends with some of them, sometimes teased, sometimes not. That year, for whatever reason, I just became the scapegoat.
I don’t think I could do that now-I still don’t know WHERE I got the balls to do it.
What makes you think that it won’t be more than a few? When do activities like this ever get the whole school participating? If there’s less than, say, 80% participation, where’s the humiliation?
But calling me Yankeroo does help explain why you had trouble making friends. :rolleyes:
And I guess I know why you side with the bullies. Way to tell someone they deserved some of the worst trauma in their lives because of a spelling error. Why don’t you haunt some of the “I’d like to kill myself” or “I have cancer threads” looking for typos? Asshole.
You either experienced a remarkably civilized school environment or have a short memory for the way things are in schools. The OP describes a scenario engineered by adults in which little kids are encouraged to choose one child in exclusion of all others. It’s silly on its face and downright cruel and antisocial upon analysis. Adults faced with this contrived social circus would laugh and walk the other way…because they can. Kids will writhe in dread, jockey for social position, and stab one another in the back to avoid being the odd man out because they can’t walk the other way.
They can’t be expected to have the social skill and self-confidence to call bullshit on such an absurd situation. Our job, as the adults in society, is to teach them acceptable methods of interaction with others and groups…rules of engagement, if you will, that will prepare them for life in a society we all hope will be compassionate and fair. This exercise undermines that end. If you seriously can’t see what’s wrong with ‘twin day’ and its kind, I don’t know what else I can say to change your mind.
I mentioned that I am a reality tv whore, right? Anyone who watched the most recent Survivor season remembers the first episode in which the contestants chose up teams schoolyard style in a scenario designed to make the members of a society reveal a pecking order and exclude two from the group. It was very painful to watch. Very painful. And no one who watched that episode, cringing with self-recognition and dread was remembering a time from his or her adult life. Everyone was thinking: School. It doesn’t matter if you were the first one picked, or the pity pick, or the second to last chosen instead of the real loser, you still remember that sinking feeling in the pit of your stomach as you consider the possibility “what if I don’t get chosen?”
Situations like these don’t arise in our adult world outside scenarios set up for our spectator pleasure. They can’t, because nobody with the slightest option would put up with it.
If the administrators want to sponsor a day when kids get to dress alike, they could at least put some of their teacher training to use and think up a situation which fosters inclusion instead of its counterpart. Offer up a competition in which children fight to get the biggest group of like-dressed peers. This would ensure that unpopular kids experience the satisfaction of being socially important…even if it’s only for one day.
I did no such thing.
Spelling error? Sure. But if it was a legitimate typo, I retract my comment. If.
:rolleyes: Maybe I shouldn’t take back that comment. Sometimes there are good reasons why someone becomes unpopular. If this is the way you acted in school, I can see why people didn’t want to spend much time with you. It’s not an excuse to bully someone, but I would be sure to avoid you when I could.
Sheesh. Of course they can. No one is forced to participate. It’s been my observation that most kids don’t. If this activity is leading to bullying, then of course it should be stopped. But I find it hard to believe that enough kids participate in some dumb school activity that it leads to some feeling this ostracized.
Well here is the update. We weren’t the only ones to think this was a dumb idea. The kids got an update on twin day which basically said that they could dress however they wanted as long as the clothes fitted the school’s standards of modesty. No skin showing when you hold your arms up and no more than two inches above the knee when you are standing. No problem there. The idea of twin day came from the Student council of the Jr. High. So it was the idea of, the people who got elected to represent the students. The popular kids. So when the administration heard from a lot of parents,they changed it to dress as you like day. So all in all a win for the good guys.