Popular Kids and Geeks-How Did They Turn Out?

[iLander]

I was bored and looked up (googled) some of my old high school classmates, especially the "popular" kids, that seemed to have it all, and the "geeks" that were shunned. Thirty + years after high school this is what I found;

Popular:
Tina- went to a second-rate college, married and works at a gift store somewhere in Tennessee. She was plain mean.
Cassie-went to a great college, married, and ended up divorced. Twice. She is a legal secretary with 2 kids, I expected a bigger job from our class president.
Mary- head cheerleader, homecoming queen, went to community college, married an A/C repairman. No job that I can see, is wasting her degree in massage therapy.

Geeks:
Bill-Asian guy, very quiet, earned a PhD and an MD from Princeton. In 4 years. Now big research guy in AIDS research, active in gay causes
Barb-picked on a LOT. Has her PhD from Harvard, and MBA from Wharton, now a big-time professor, married
Stephanie-geeky,thick glasses, full scholarship, owns her own consulting business, married

I always tell my kids that high school is NO Indicator of future success, and those popular kids won't have the world on a string for long. I envied them a lot in high school, they were good-looking, jocks, pretty, etc., even the teachers seemed to favor them. I guess I expected their lives to be full of limousines, sequin dresses, and glamour, just the way they looked at school dances. Now I wouldn't want to be any of them.

The geeks seem to have done alright for themselves. I was sure they would crawl into holes, never to be heard from again.

How did the popular kids (and geeky kids) from your high school turn out?

Edited for clarity.

 

[ame]

With few exceptions, clinging to their high school glory days, not living far from where we all grew up and still bullying people whenever possible, especially someone who worked their butt off and is now socially higher ranking than they are.

 

[asscherisme]

The old joke goes: What do you call the geeky kids from high school in 20 years? Boss.

 

[Jennifer W]

I got some interesting experience of this when I was a lay inspector of prisons.
SB, bully, all round nasty guy at school - no further education, never held a full time job, serving 12 years for aggravated burglary and assault.

KG, geek, all round butt of jokes girl, picked on a lot at school- science degree and Masters degree - serving life for murder (and not just the one).

The rest of us are somewhere in between.

 

[maplefemme]

I had a friend in High School who pushed the boundaries of the school uniform as much as one could. She had a different color in her hair every week and and out of school she wore black lace gloves, punk hair and too short skirts. She never got into any trouble, she was academically excellent, she just looked like a wild child and she had a strong mind, she was very confident.
She came to my house once to see if I wanted to hang out. My Dad took one look at her and told me I could not associate with her, he said she looked like a hooker and was a bad influence, he judged her as having loose morality simply by appearances.

That was in the 80's, today she is a leading scientist in the field of fighter jet technology, she's a genius!
I couldn't wait to tell my Father when I found out on my last trip home to the UK.
Just goes to show, don't judge a book by its cover.

 

[Lottie]

An awful lot of the 'popular' girls in my school went down in a swathe of teen pregnancies at about 17 or 18, one proper meanie who I would describe as 'rough' rather than popular now reguarly holidays in prison. Another of the popular girls is now bi polar and has attempted suicide more than once which is really sad because she was such a happy, witty girl and I LOVED sitting with her in lessons. Of the more scholarly/nerdy pupils a couple went to Cambridge and Oxford and gained PHD's but we live in a fairly rural area and if you were going to really do anything incredible then you needed to move away.

I would probably have been classed as one of the popular girls (although definately not a headliner and definately not mean) but I had a lot of friends in different groups and when I look back I can find examples of good and bad outcomes in both popular and scholarly. Its only human to be a bit satisfied when the person that picked on your sister at 13 because she rode horses finds herself saddled with a child at 16, but for the most part I just feel a bit sad that some of those high hopes and big dreams have come to nothing for some people.

 

[monarch64]

I don't know about popularity/geek status, but I do know that most of my nice, intelligent, and ambitious classmates have been successful and are happy. Anyone whose personality I didn't really care for I still don't care enough to check up on. Better things to do with my time than gloat over someone's lack of success later in life whether they were nice to me or not.

 

[NovemberBride]

You know, I think a lot of people take satisfaction in the idea that people that were "popular" or "mean" in high school will end up in miserable circumstances (poor, alone, overweight) and that the less "popular" or "dorky" people will all be rich and beautiful. It's a classic Hollywood story that has been told time and again. Especially if the person in question did not fall into the popular category themselves, they want some sort of vindication. I personally find it very distasteful and think it smacks of sour grapes. I find adults who spend time looking down at the former popular kids much worse than the popular kids who may have ignored or picked on them as teens. After all, as adults we should know better.

I am sure we can all find an example of someone we know that was popular and has had a rough time later in life and a geek who has made well. I am just as certain that there are popular kids who are now CEOs and doctors and geeks who are unemployed or working in less glamorous jobs.

For the record, I was a considered popular in high school as were my friends (cheerleaders, homecoming court, student government, etc). My HS friends are still my closest friends, and by all accounts we are all successful. Between us we have a lawyer, a consultant for the FBI, a registered dietician, a neonatal nurse, 2 sales executives and a government contractor. Several of us are happily married with kids and several others are happily enjoying the single life. I also keep in touch on facebook with others from my high school who would not have been considered popular, and many of them seem to be happy and successful as well. I recently attended by 15 year reunion (gah!) and overall it seemed like everyone had done well for themselves and even better, no one cared who was popular or not 15 years ago! Which is a good thing since we are all in our 30's!

 

[Haven]

I understand the temptation to judge a person's success based on her career or which college she attended. Honestly, though, I'm far more interested in whether someone has carved out a life for herself that suits her own personal needs, desires, and definition of success.

I've only kept up with my own friends from high school, so I have no idea what happened to the other kids from my class. My friends are all doing well for themselves. They live lives that they find fulfilling, so I couldn't ask for more for them. I think we were a loud, social group. Not popular, not geeks, just there, minding our own business.

I was the kid who dyed her hair every color possible, had 17 piercings, and refused to do much of my school work because it seemed pointless. I still managed all As and Bs, though. I was a good kid, didn't get in too much trouble, I just had a rebel streak to me. I'm really happy and satisfied with my life now, so I turned out okay despite what others may have thought might happen. I have since taken out most of the piercings, and now I never dye my hair.

 

[luv2sparkle]

I find this to be true and interesting too Ilander. I think you have to be far enough away from high school to appreciate it. I have always told all my kids to not worry about being popular in high school because some of the saddest people I have ever met got their 15 minutes of fame in high school. I think sometimes teenagers think that that is an indication of what their life will be like. Everything is always good, everyone applaudes them and always will and it is hard for them to adjust.

I am sure it is not true for every kid who does well in high school, my kids did well, but it a warning to heed. In my class of 77 in l977,
there is a mix. Some of the most popular guys are really sad now, and some of the not so popular girls turned out to be stunningly beautiful. One girl in particular was seriously homely in high school. When we went to our 10th reunion she was drop dead gorgeous. I mean, if someone would have not told you who she was, you would have never believed it. It was a jaw dropping wow! No plastic surgery involved. I love that kind of transformation story! I don't know what happened to her after that, but I was glad to see her get that wonderful moment of glory for herself.

 

[jaysonsmom]

What I found to be true, after connecting with all my peers on FB, was that most the really good-looking guys and girls from high school with hot bodies are all looking used up and old with flabby post-baby bodies or beer guts. All the chubby/homely ones transformed for the better. Probably because the hot ones were at their physical peak in high-school, and the rest really blossomed after high school. Some probably strived to improve their looks due to bullying or teasing in their youth.

My observation was that a lot of the kids who were kind of in middle of the popularity spectrum became the most successful.

At my age (almost 40) is when you start to see a HUGE difference in how your personality, lifestyle etc affect your looks. Some of the people I know look like hillbilly grandparents, while others don't look a day over 25! No frown lines, no worried creases!

 

[Autumnovember]

The popular kids: its split kind of in half. A lot of them have gone on and pursued very big goals and they're definitely out there making those dreams and goals come true. Some doctors, some lawyers, some artists, some photographers, some journalists, and one a playboy playmate back in 2007. The others? A few have gone to jail, others are on probation, some do absolutely NOTHING, some graduated college with a useless degree (I'll prob get crap for this) and they're content. I think a lot of them still cling onto the idea that they were popular in HS which must mean that all of us peasants still regard them in the same way but I think deep down they know its no longer true.

The geeks: They too are pursuing big dreams and making it. It's nice to see. Its even more interesting to see how because of Facebook, a lot of us exchange thoughts/ideas/jokes on there no matter what our "status" was in HS. I can't really think of any geeks that haven't become something or aren't in the process.

Looks wise? A lot of the popular kids just don't look as "pretty" anymore. They look typical/boring for some reason. Not all, but some. Some are still so beautiful.

Geeks? Some still look geeky as heck but they don't care and other have definitely grown up and look different in a nice way.

I wonder what people from my HS think of me and how I am now. Hm. Doubt they ever thought I'd be married by 23 or that I would be a nurse.

Also, I should add that I don't know what I was in HS. An in-betweener? I had a solid group of friends who I loved very much and have remained friends with.

I did not go to my 5 year HS reunion (stupid, right?!) about 2 years ago because I felt that not enough had really changed then and I also just wasn't interested in what anyone except my group of friends was up to.

 

[Black Jade]

I don't know about popularity/geek status, but I do know that most of my nice, intelligent, and ambitious classmates have been successful and are happy. Anyone whose personality I didn't really care for I still don't care enough to check up on. Better things to do with my time than gloat over someone's lack of success later in life whether they were nice to me or not.

Ditto.
You and November Bride have it right. Life is too short. Why are people still worried about this?
It's interesting not only to read the gloating in some of the posts over once-popular people supposedly having ALL gone to seed but the ideas of what a successful life is. I don't get why being married to an AC repairman is a terrible fate. AC repairmen actually make a lot of money--6 figures--and their jobs can't be outsourced to India or China, you know? Maybe some people are HAPPY being other than doctors, lawyers or what have you and maybe they have spouses who love them and nice children even if they no longer have cheerleader waistlines.
I was popular in high school by the way-40 years ago so I don't think about it very much anymore--I had my moments when I was an insecure kid and gossiped or something I wouldn't do at this stage of my life, but I don't think I was mean to anybody. It was a matter of luck and good genetics that I happened not to get zits back then (some people don't) and I didn't think it made me better than anyone else. Boys liked me but my parents didn't believe in dating (they are foreign). So I studied hard and I went to an Ivy League and then got a graduate degree from an Ivy League also, because pretty people are not necessarily dumb and vapid. (Except in the movies of course).

In college, I married a guy who was a geek in high school, because I liked him as a human being and thought he was a great person. Others didn't think he was that good-looking then, but like many women who are born pretty, looks are not important to me in judging other people. I thought (and think) of being pretty as something accidental, which doesn't have that much to do with what you are inside; and also like many other pretty people, have always hated people looking at me and then deciding what kind of person I am because they like my outside. I don't feel my outside has much to do with my inside, so always tried to judge others by their insides too. I am not complaining, I know being pretty is lucky in our society, but you can also get truly, truly stressed, always being judged by what has nothing to do with who you are, and having some guy (many guys) decide you are their fantasy and that you OWE them something somehow because they decided to be attracted to you. Scarlet O'Hara looks like she's in a good position with the guys fighting over her fan at the ball, but in real life, this is often a STRESSFUL position to be in, and frankly when I was in high school, I used to feel like I was walking a gauntlet coming in the school door and having the guys all get quiet and turn around to stare--while many of the other girls got mad. All of them absolutely not knowing who I really was, and not interested in bothering to find out, except thank God I did make friends, funny, people, bright people, some of them attractive according to social standards and some not--but all of them great people who bothered to look below the surface of people.

Funny thing, no one knows anymore that my husband was considered a geek once. As he got older, he grew into himself, and everybody now sees on the outside what I always saw on the inside and says, what an attractive man (which he is). I am 55 and I am still pretty, because life is not like the movies and there are plenty of people who start out pretty and stay pretty--there's no screen director in real life who decides, that one has had her share of pretty and now that she's middle aged let's make things fair by having her teeth and hair all fall out. Or something like that. I am more comfortable with myself now though and I think that if people have got to this age and don't realize YET that it's not an important quality in life, and want to make something of it, they probably will never learn. If they don't want to talk to people and find out what they are like, but just judge all the books by their covers and if it makes them feel better to decide that all pretty people are shallow and dumb or bullies or whatever, I can't help that and I'm not worried about it. My father was handsome until he was 70 (when he died) and he was the kindest person I ever met--and the most decent, always sought out the person in the room who looked uncomfortable for WHATEVER reason and was good to them adn tried to draw them out. And he was very intelligent, and thoughtful. Although, because he was a mechanic and worked with his hands, maybe some of you on this list wouldn't have bothered to talk to him to find that out.

 

[yennyfire]

I couldn't agree more Black Jade...well said!

 

[justginger]

I see this thread, started as a bit of "isn't life funny", Romy and Michelle's High School Reunion-style, tongue in cheek fun as going downhill very quickly. The ex-geeks are rallying that the person who gave them swirlies is a lifetime WalMart greeter and they're a Nobel Prize winner, and the ex-popular kids are rallying that they were always nice people (bullies conveniently never remember being total asshats) and are happy with 3 pageant-winning children and a house at the lake, all y'all are just still jealous losers. There's already a 2 paragraph soliloquy about how the normal girls never understood the difficulties of being gorgeous... Talk about a can of worms, ilander!

And for the record, I was Jill Average in HS, so thankfully no old wounds or axes to grind!

 

[rainydaze]

I understand the temptation to judge a person's success based on her career or which college she attended. Honestly, though, I'm far more interested in whether someone has carved out a life for herself that suits her own personal needs, desires, and definition of success.


Bingo! iLander, what exactly is wrong with community college and being an AC repairman?

as someone who went to community college - and was successful in my career - and who has known people in blue collar professions and considered them great successes in life, i fail to see how that automatically qualifies one for ridicule. character, integrity, happiness, fulfillment, self-sufficiency, work ethic - those are qualities that define success in my book. people can have high degrees/ambitious careers and still lack some of these things, while others can have all of those things without the degrees/ambitious careers.

my point being, if i were to look back i would care more to discover if the mean kids improved their character, and if the picked-upon kids overcome their abuse to live a life that brings them joy.

 

[iLander]

I see this thread, started as a bit of "isn't life funny", Romy and Michelle's High School Reunion-style, tongue in cheek fun as going downhill very quickly. The ex-geeks are rallying that the person who gave them swirlies is a lifetime WalMart greeter and they're a Nobel Prize winner, and the ex-popular kids are rallying that they were always nice people (bullies conveniently never remember being total asshats) and are happy with 3 pageant-winning children and a house at the lake, all y'all are just still jealous losers. There's already a 2 paragraph soliloquy about how the normal girls never understood the difficulties of being gorgeous... Talk about a can of worms, ilander!

And for the record, I was Jill Average in HS, so thankfully no old wounds or axes to grind!

EXACTLY! It was supposed to be a no-big-deal, light, thread. But no. . .

It IS a can of worms! I will ask the mods to close it, since people are taking it SO personally.

If it helps anyone, I was BEST FRIENDS with one geek girl and one popular girl, both are on that list, and I keep in touch with both, so no axes to grind from me either.

And I don't sit around thinking about it, I just saw an ad from Classmates dot com, and it made me think of it plus I said I was bored . . .

 

[Dancing Fire]

nahhh, no big deal iLander. i am one of those dummy in HS and still am...

 

[luv2sparkle]

It's all ok Ilander! I think it is a really interesting topic! I am glad you brought it up!

 

[allycat0303]

Hmm this is interesting thread. I think it's a misconception that popular, pretty people end up doing less well. In HS, I would have considered myself more on the geeky side, I've done ok. My husband was a crazy popular, captain of hockey team, and I think he's done very well. I think beauty/popular has very little to do with whether or not you are going to be successful. I think the problem is when teenagers begin to define themselves uniquely as *pretty and popular*, they are then less inclined to strive for other achievements. And so many factors can play into it, your life skills, who you pick as a partner in life, the decisions you make, all of this can influence success.

And I also don't make assumptions from what I see on-line/on Facebook. No one's life is what it seems on the surface. They may be much happier then you. It also depends on how you define success, for some it's healthy children, while for others it might be making a huge salary. All very relative and subjective, so I think it's best NOT to compare.

BlackJade I love what you wrote. VERY honest, and down to earth.

 

[canuk-gal]

I couldn't agree more Black Jade...well said!

HI:

Yup. I don't "think" about other people at all.

cheers--Sharon

 

[monarch64]

I see this thread, started as a bit of "isn't life funny", Romy and Michelle's High School Reunion-style, tongue in cheek fun as going downhill very quickly. The ex-geeks are rallying that the person who gave them swirlies is a lifetime WalMart greeter and they're a Nobel Prize winner, and the ex-popular kids are rallying that they were always nice people (bullies conveniently never remember being total asshats) and are happy with 3 pageant-winning children and a house at the lake, all y'all are just still jealous losers. There's already a 2 paragraph soliloquy about how the normal girls never understood the difficulties of being gorgeous... Talk about a can of worms, ilander!

And for the record, I was Jill Average in HS, so thankfully no old wounds or axes to grind!

EXACTLY! It was supposed to be a no-big-deal, light, thread. But no. . .

It IS a can of worms! I will ask the mods to close it, since people are taking it SO personally.

If it helps anyone, I was BEST FRIENDS with one geek girl and one popular girl, both are on that list, and I keep in touch with both, so no axes to grind from me either.

And I don't sit around thinking about it, I just saw an ad from Classmates dot com, and it made me think of it plus I said I was bored . . .

***WARNING*** tongue-in-cheek, light-hearted reply!!!

iLander...were you a theater student in high school? Your response is a *bit* dramatic, don't you think? Also, if you indeed WERE a theater student, I would like to know how famous you became.

 

[beebrisk]

One of the biggest geeks in my high school (of 2700 people) is now a major broadcaster and network anchor, regularly interviewing world leaders and celebrities....You'd all know him if I stated his name here.

He was skinny, had crooked teeth, big ears and chased after the most popular girls who just laughed at his efforts. Well, he got back at all of them, but good! He grew up, got a good dentist, had his ears pinned back, scored one of the best gigs on TV and was even considered one of the "most eligible bachelors" before his marriage.

It just goes to show, you never know--And, its another reason why I tell my 16 year old niece to be nice to the nerds.

You have to wonder though, if the unfair treatment he got in school for his nerdy ways is precisely what motivated him to achieve the "status" and tremendous financial success he has now.

 

[Haven]

This thread makes me feel like I missed out on a very American experience by attending a large high school. We had over 4,000 students, it was way too big to be cliquey. There were a handful of kids that were known for being super involved, but if we had a group of popular kids or a group of geeks, I didn't know about them.

 

[Autumnovember]

I don't know about popularity/geek status, but I do know that most of my nice, intelligent, and ambitious classmates have been successful and are happy. Anyone whose personality I didn't really care for I still don't care enough to check up on. Better things to do with my time than gloat over someone's lack of success later in life whether they were nice to me or not.

Ditto.
You and November Bride have it right. Life is too short. Why are people still worried about this?
It's interesting not only to read the gloating in some of the posts over once-popular people supposedly having ALL gone to seed but the ideas of what a successful life is. I don't get why being married to an AC repairman is a terrible fate. AC repairmen actually make a lot of money--6 figures--and their jobs can't be outsourced to India or China, you know? Maybe some people are HAPPY being other than doctors, lawyers or what have you and maybe they have spouses who love them and nice children even if they no longer have cheerleader waistlines.
I was popular in high school by the way-40 years ago so I don't think about it very much anymore--I had my moments when I was an insecure kid and gossiped or something I wouldn't do at this stage of my life, but I don't think I was mean to anybody. It was a matter of luck and good genetics that I happened not to get zits back then (some people don't) and I didn't think it made me better than anyone else. Boys liked me but my parents didn't believe in dating (they are foreign). So I studied hard and I went to an Ivy League and then got a graduate degree from an Ivy League also, because pretty people are not necessarily dumb and vapid. (Except in the movies of course).

In college, I married a guy who was a geek in high school, because I liked him as a human being and thought he was a great person. Others didn't think he was that good-looking then, but like many women who are born pretty, looks are not important to me in judging other people. I thought (and think) of being pretty as something accidental, which doesn't have that much to do with what you are inside; and also like many other pretty people, have always hated people looking at me and then deciding what kind of person I am because they like my outside. I don't feel my outside has much to do with my inside, so always tried to judge others by their insides too. I am not complaining, I know being pretty is lucky in our society, but you can also get truly, truly stressed, always being judged by what has nothing to do with who you are, and having some guy (many guys) decide you are their fantasy and that you OWE them something somehow because they decided to be attracted to you. Scarlet O'Hara looks like she's in a good position with the guys fighting over her fan at the ball, but in real life, this is often a STRESSFUL position to be in, and frankly when I was in high school, I used to feel like I was walking a gauntlet coming in the school door and having the guys all get quiet and turn around to stare--while many of the other girls got mad. All of them absolutely not knowing who I really was, and not interested in bothering to find out, except thank God I did make friends, funny, people, bright people, some of them attractive according to social standards and some not--but all of them great people who bothered to look below the surface of people.

Funny thing, no one knows anymore that my husband was considered a geek once. As he got older, he grew into himself, and everybody now sees on the outside what I always saw on the inside and says, what an attractive man (which he is). I am 55 and I am still pretty, because life is not like the movies and there are plenty of people who start out pretty and stay pretty--there's no screen director in real life who decides, that one has had her share of pretty and now that she's middle aged let's make things fair by having her teeth and hair all fall out. Or something like that. I am more comfortable with myself now though and I think that if people have got to this age and don't realize YET that it's not an important quality in life, and want to make something of it, they probably will never learn. If they don't want to talk to people and find out what they are like, but just judge all the books by their covers and if it makes them feel better to decide that all pretty people are shallow and dumb or bullies or whatever, I can't help that and I'm not worried about it. My father was handsome until he was 70 (when he died) and he was the kindest person I ever met--and the most decent, always sought out the person in the room who looked uncomfortable for WHATEVER reason and was good to them adn tried to draw them out. And he was very intelligent, and thoughtful. Although, because he was a mechanic and worked with his hands, maybe some of you on this list wouldn't have bothered to talk to him to find that out.

I'm sorry but I would really love to hear from someone who IS NOT good looking and listen to how crappy that could be too. I Talk to all walks of life of all professions or lack there of. I didn't get the impression that some people here might not talk to a certain kind of person? Maybe I missed something.

 

[Imdanny]

You know, I think a lot of people take satisfaction in the idea that people that were "popular" or "mean" in high school will end up in miserable circumstances (poor, alone, overweight) and that the less "popular" or "dorky" people will all be rich and beautiful. It's a classic Hollywood story that has been told time and again. Especially if the person in question did not fall into the popular category themselves, they want some sort of vindication. I personally find it very distasteful and think it smacks of sour grapes. I find adults who spend time looking down at the former popular kids much worse than the popular kids who may have ignored or picked on them as teens. After all, as adults we should know better.

I agree with Black Jade and you that this is the stuff of Hollywood screenplays but I respectfully disagree with Monarch and you when you say iLander and the rest of us are doing something in your words worse than kids who picked on others.

This thread doesn't personally affect anyone so it's not the same thing, and to say that it's worse when IRL kids who are picked on sometimes commit suicide doesn't make sense either.

We're all adults and this is the age of social media. It's only natural for people to think about others they've known. I also think it's unremarkable to find irony in life. If there weren't irony in the subject of high school I doubt it would be such a popular one in movies, etc.

 

[steph72276]

Well, I think it's very narrow minded to judge someone's success by their career path. I had very high grades all throughout school and could have done many many things, but chose to go to a small school and become a teacher because that's what I was passionate about. I didn't care about having a high powered career or making a ton of money. Then after I had kids, I chose to stay at home with them because that's what made me fell fulfilled as a person. I think happiness and fulfillment in one's life is a better indicator of success than chosen career path. There are a lot of unhappy people that make a lot of money, and I wouldn't trade my life with those people for anything. I also think that being secure and happy with yourself lends to not putting others' choices down to make yourself feel better.

 

[NovemberBride]

You know, I think a lot of people take satisfaction in the idea that people that were "popular" or "mean" in high school will end up in miserable circumstances (poor, alone, overweight) and that the less "popular" or "dorky" people will all be rich and beautiful. It's a classic Hollywood story that has been told time and again. Especially if the person in question did not fall into the popular category themselves, they want some sort of vindication. I personally find it very distasteful and think it smacks of sour grapes. I find adults who spend time looking down at the former popular kids much worse than the popular kids who may have ignored or picked on them as teens. After all, as adults we should know better.

I agree with Black Jade and you that this is the stuff of Hollywood screenplays but I respectfully disagree with Monarch and you when you say iLander and the rest of us are doing something in your words worse than kids who picked on others.

This thread doesn't personally affect anyone so it's not the same thing, and to say that it's worse when IRL kids who are picked on sometimes commit suicide doesn't make sense either.

We're all adults and this is the age of social media. It's only natural for people to think about others they've known. I also think it's unremarkable to find irony in life. If there weren't irony in the subject of high school I doubt it would be such a popular one in movies, etc.

ImDanny, my comments in no way were intended to make light of the terrible bullying that goes on in high school and which has led to suicide, which I am appalled by and which I can honestly say I thankfully never saw in my high school. What I meant by my comment was that adults gossiping/gloating about how someone is ugly, overweight, poor, etc is, in my opinion, worse than teenagers doing the same thing because the adults should know better. And I think finding irony in life is different than deliberately searching out people you haven't seen in years with the hope that their life hasn't measured up to your standards of sucess so that you can gloat about it and feel better about yourself. I for one hope that everyone I went to high school with has been fortunate enough to find a life that fulfills them as I have. For example - I can honestly say I would take no pleasure from finding out that the girl who my boyfriend cheated on me with ended up getting cheated on by her husband. I guess that might be "ironic" , but to me it would just be sad and that's how I feel about this whole topic.

 

[monarch64]

You know, I think a lot of people take satisfaction in the idea that people that were "popular" or "mean" in high school will end up in miserable circumstances (poor, alone, overweight) and that the less "popular" or "dorky" people will all be rich and beautiful. It's a classic Hollywood story that has been told time and again. Especially if the person in question did not fall into the popular category themselves, they want some sort of vindication. I personally find it very distasteful and think it smacks of sour grapes. I find adults who spend time looking down at the former popular kids much worse than the popular kids who may have ignored or picked on them as teens. After all, as adults we should know better.

I agree with Black Jade and you that this is the stuff of Hollywood screenplays but I respectfully disagree with Monarch and you when you say iLander and the rest of us are doing something in your words worse than kids who picked on others.

This thread doesn't personally affect anyone so it's not the same thing, and to say that it's worse when IRL kids who are picked on sometimes commit suicide doesn't make sense either.

We're all adults and this is the age of social media. It's only natural for people to think about others they've known. I also think it's unremarkable to find irony in life. If there weren't irony in the subject of high school I doubt it would be such a popular one in movies, etc.

I didn't say that, Danny. Try reading the posts in their entirety next time. ETA: Also, read the OP. The poster says she is teaching her kids not to worry about the popular kids because basically they won't amount to anything. If that isn't teaching children to be judgmental and not open-minded towards their peers, I don't know what is, and it's very much REAL LIFE.

 

[princesss]

Wow. Maybe my school was weird, but I can't think of a single person that isn't living a pretty fabulous life right now. Some are waiting tables in Chicago and acting in plays, some are working on Wall Street, some moved back to our home town (a very cosmopolitan city in Southeast Asia) and found jobs, a few are modeling, and one in particular (the girl I have realized I will always be insanely jealous of - stunning, popular, athletic, etc.) is living with her boyfriend in Hawaii and having a great time. All those people span the popular/unpopular spectrum, but I can't think of a single person off of the top of my head that I know from high school that isn't living a life that makes them happy right now.

I will say that, at the moment, the popular kids are generally the most successful/living the most glamourous lives. But us unpopular kids aren't exactly hating life now, either...