High school is still the same, and it sucks

[merithyn]

As for your daughter's experience, it seems pretty extreme to me.  Can't relate either in terms of my own high school days or the experience of my boys now.

I haven't asked my boys yet. I'll let you know what they say.

That being said, I'm pretty certain that my youngest son doesn't think like that, though he has friends who do. The elder two wouldn't have been as open about it, if they thought it.

[Malthus]

In my social circle in HS, the notion that women were to be shamed for sex was an absurdity.

Selfishness with drugs was the issue for shaming (men and women alike), not sex.

I suspect you were too stoned to notice 

Well, there *was* that. 

But remember how I met my best friend? That sort of meeting would be unlikely in a social group that had a strong anti-female-sex taboo, where women feared being labelled a "slut".   

[Sheilbh]

American high school: like in the movies?

[garbon]

I was very respectful toward girls in high school.

I was too. I didn't figure out that didn't work until much later. 

[Iormlund]

I do remember once in a bar when a pretty hott girl was complaining about how guys would tell their friends lies if she went with them, call her slut and such.

Then she proceeded to hook up with the one guy in the whole gang that would do exactly that (there was another asshole, but he wasn't there that night).

[grumbler]

Wow, am I glad I don't teach in that high school! 

I suppose that there must be schools full of such social rejects as the school Meri's daughter goes to, but I've not taught at one or had a student transfer from or to one.  I can assure Meri that her experience, and that of her daughter, is not universal.

[DGuller]

I had an interesting conversation with Riley the other day that's kind of disturbed me.

She was talking about how she just can't win with boys her age. (She's almost 15, and in the 9th grade.) If she's nice to them, she's a bitch for leading them on when she doesn't like them. If she's not nice to them, she's a bitch for not being nice. The conversation continued to the fact that it just gets worse when the boys get older.

You're a cocktease if you don't have sex after making out for X amount of time (or if, god forbid, you actually let them touch your tatas ), but if you don't make out with them (or let them touch your tatas), you're a frigid bitch. God forbid you actually have sex with them - and worse, enjoy it! - because then you're just a slut and a whore.

Basically, what we both learned in this conversation is that teenage boys are horrible, horrible creatures. This is how high school girls get into trouble. They really are in a damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don't situation with these guys. No matter what she does, Riley will be a bitch/slut/whore/frigid bitch.

I really thought we'd be past this 30 years after I was in high school, but no, it's just as bad as ever. Thankfully, Riley is a lot like her mother and thinks they can all go to hell (just like I did), but it sucks that this is still happening.

What about high school did you hope would change, but clearly hasn't? What did you guys have to deal with that put you in a  damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don't situation?

Inquiring minds and all that.

I guess another thing that didn't change is teenage girls being over-dramatic and hyperbolic.

[The Brain]

I never heard anything about either slut or frigid bitch in high school. If I had it would have struck me as being incredibly immature for our age. Of course I went to an elite high school where the garbage had already been weeded out.

[crazy canuck]

I was very respectful toward girls in high school.

I was too. I didn't figure out that didn't work until much later. 

I dont know about that either.  Worked quite well for me. 

[Iormlund]

I was very respectful toward girls in high school.

I was too. I didn't figure out that didn't work until much later. 

I dont know about that either.  Worked quite well for me. 

Yeah, but you are freakishly tall. My only asset is that I know how to dance, and I hadn't figured out that by then either. 

[Ideologue]

The only thing about me is the way that I walk.

[Malthus]

I was very respectful toward girls in high school.

I was too. I didn't figure out that didn't work until much later. 

I dont know about that either.  Worked quite well for me. 

Yeah, but you are freakishly tall. My only asset is that I know how to dance, and I hadn't figured out that by then either. 

Heh, I'll go with my freakish buddy CC on this one - though I'll say this: being respectful isn't going to get you laid in and of itself, it is more of a basic precondition for getting laid, like bathing regularly.  Women still have to have some *positive* reason to be attracted to you, not just a lack of negative reasons to avoid you.

[MadImmortalMan]

I think if Riley pays attention, she's only talking about the boys she's attracted to. The nice ones are the ones she never even considers and has never wasted a firing synapse thinking about.

[Grey Fox]

I don't remember much of High school but this dynamic only happens to popular kids.

[mongers]

American high school: like in the movies?

Yes I was thinking that to.

Do those high school experiences/social dynamics exist outside movies and if so, how common are those and are they that extreme?


Just to clarify for us Euro/Brits, this is mandatory school for 14-18 year olds ?