Lorne ,'Why We Fight'
[NAFDA] Spike-centric discussion. Lusty, lewd (only occasionally crude), risqué (and frisqué), bawdy (Oh, lawdy!), flirty ('cuz we're purty), raunchy talk inside. Caveat lector.
I think the line may be between not wanting to play with someone and convincing all their friends to exclude the same kid ... and, often, letting the excluded kid know that they're being shut out.
And then there is the next level. Exclusion or even blunt exclusion were fond memories once they ramped it up flat-out harassment.
The thing that still tends to still effect my behavior to this day were the girls who would be nice to me, compliment me, etc either to laugh as soon as I walked away or to try and get me to say something that could be made fun of. I am still so suspicious of people who are nice! That was 2nd - 5th grade. I don't think people were particularly mean after that-- there was just a hierarchy established and we stuck to it.
There are benefits to having been excluded so long that they've forgotten you exist.
That was 2nd - 5th grade.
To this day, I call sneakers "gym shoes" because the Mean Girls in the 2nd grade made fun of me for calling them "sneakers". I suppose I could try getting over it, but, I've got a lot bigger baggage to handle, y'know?
(Of course, they also made fun of me for pronouncing "barrette", "crayon", and "spaghetti" correctly, and I didn't change my pronunciation to make them happy, because they were stupid.)
Does anyone know anybody who was a Mean Girl? Have they ever explained why they did it?
There are benefits to having been excluded so long that they've forgotten you exist.
It may depend on the child's personality. For the shy child that would prefer to read, run around catching butterflies, or engage in other solitary activities, being excluded and forgotten may be a fine situation. For the more gregarious child, being forgotten may be an improvement over being harassed, it probably wouldn't feel as good as for the shy child.
Point. I was the "my book and I are happy back here behind the folded up cafeteria tables, thanks" type.
The Mean Girls I know now don't remember it. I am Facebook friends with them. One of them sent me a note when I joined about how much she admired me, and how she always imagined me leaving our small town behind and doing really big things.
My stepmother is still the worst Mean Girl I know.(It's only slightly as sick as it sounds--there are only ten years between us.) So my mother is partially right--some of that crap *does* come from jealousy, although not as often as my mother told me that, because I didn't stock the Four Corners with awesome, or anything.
Does anyone know anybody who was a Mean Girl? Have they ever explained why they did it?
I know plenty who still are... I'm just better at avoiding them now.
There was one mean girl from my youth who I saw in a picture on facebook and she'd gotten pretty plump. She'd been particularly rail-thin as a kid and rather nasty to anyone who was not (and was not one of her friends). Not long after I was at a party with some old friends (who I see maybe once every few years) and we were all "Dude, Mary C____ got FAT... I shouldn't care... but... man..." and then we'd all laugh. We knew we should be over it entirely, but apparently we were not. For the next little while, "Mary's FAT" could send us into hysterics. It was awesome.