Why I have every intention of killing the freshman.

Some background before I begin ranting: Recently, a book was published titled “Please Don’t Kill the Freshman” in Oregon, by a fifteen year-old, logging her diary entries. Everyone seems totally enoamored by it, and it’ll probably be picked up by a publisher for about 100k. And I am STEAMED.

Oh yes. You’d like to think I’m doing this out of jealousy. Or spite. No, it’s out of anger. Pure, unadultered anger. You’ve gotten on my nerves for the whole two years I’ve known you, and now this. This great, brilliant, Emporer’s New Book. I’m sure you’re proud of yourself. A fifteen year-old’s life, written exactly like a fifteen year-old. With your characteristic crudeness and everything. WHY? The book was horrid, I read it myself! WHY ARE SO MANY BABBLING ABOUT IT?

Not just that, some of what occurs didn’t happen! Oh yes, the unvarnished truth about a Freshman’s life, I’m certain. The deal was made BEFORE you wrote the diary entries! THIS IS NOT HONEST RETELLING! THIS IS A JADED COLORING OF THE FACTS TO BE MORE INTELLECTUAL!

Oh, it gets worse. You’ve ruined some of the best people I know. You and your control freak ways, trying to manipulate many of your friends. You chose this person, a great guy, and now look. This is horrid. He’s clinging to you, but for no apparent reason. No attraction, nothing. You’ve subdued him. BUT WHY? WHY?

You have such novel theories about sexuality. So “new” and avant-garde, that nobody actually ever bothers to consider how freaking outrageous they are! “Everyone’s bi until they sleep with someone, then they know”. Oh yes, these are great to force onto your friends. There’s a reason you attract a lot of homosexuals, possibly due to the pressure you put on them to be that way. One of my best friends in high school, one of the few I care about right now, is now horribly averse to your presence, just because you’ve decided that she’s a lesbian. This person is not homophobic in any way, shape, or form. If she thought for a moment that she had a different sexuality than the “norm”, she would not deny it. Obviously she doesn’t, but you have decided she does.

It was tempting for awhile to pretend that I could have written something similar, and stolen this opportunity away. That’s untrue. I know it. I’m too “conservative”. Not in the political sense, where I rival you in some areas of being liberal (although you’d never admit it, since I’m not an enviromentalist), but in just demonar. You try to make yourself seem as crude as possible, which makes your writing sound like a fifteen year-olds. I, with my distaste for so much of the swearing and oh-so-questionable themes in my own writing, and my willingness to think things through, could never write such pure and unadultered thoughts of a fifteen year-old.

I hope you’re happy. I know life will be so hard now that you’re recognized, although you have this great gimmick of modesty. I hope that the people that you put down in your writing, some of the best people I know, who know who they are, will somehow change. I hope that this is all very nice. Maybe you’ll write a sequal. I hate this. I spend all this time trying to learn through school, hoping to be successful, trying to find out all I can about my interests, debating, everything, and yet the recognition all goes out to someone who’s not afraid to act like a fifteen year-old.

I loathe this. My only solace comes in the fact that after I graduate tomorrow, I should never see you again. Unless you somehow popularize yourself more. Then I’ll move. And it’s precious comfort to my sister (who I may have rant too), my sister whom had her friends stolen or defamed by you. Who will be with you for the next two years, but without the $100,000. She’s a better person, and will be more successful than you’ll ever be. I don’t care if you make more money, or be more known. This will bite you someday. I pray.

Sounds like some girls I knew in high school. I doubt such a book would be successful, however. Catcher in the Rye was a successful book written about being 17 from the viewpoint of a 17 year old character. The reason it’s readable is the voice of reason and maturity that injects itself at the end. Salinger isn’t 17, he knows better. Teenagers have a knack for thinking that their worldviews are the end-all-be-all and that everyone will want to hear about them, and Holden epitomizes that. Salinger knows that Holden is wrong. That’s the difference.

Of course, this still sounds like the type of girl who could go far. Remember that movie “Election”? The type of girl who would do this undoubtably has confidence in truckloads, and that can take people pretty far these days.

Oh, BTW…if there’s even a whiff of defamation, no publishing house will touch it, of that much you can be sure.

I was in a very very angry mood when I wrote this, so I used fairly strong words. In this instance, defamation really meant casting them in an overly negative light, with few positives to back it up, and selectively choosing stories that made her look bad (some of which may be “colored”). So it wasn’t quite as strong as I sounded, but strong enough to make me mad.

Great rant, Netbrian. Which I mean as a compliment, not that it’s great that this person is behaving/has behaved in a way that has caused you to become this angry. If it makes you feel any better, this person will probably never in her life find things falling into her lap as easily as this book deal seems to have fallen. And the rest of her life will be a big letdown, because she peaked before she was twenty. Oh, and see my sig for another possible morsel of comfort.