What the !@#$%^ ?
He was a smart productive kid, and he got picked on by imbeciles.
Now he's a smart productive adult.
He hasn't gotten shit together - he had it together.
The difference is that now he's in a free market, with other competent adults, instead of in a government-run Lord of the Flies style child warehousing make-work program.
To say that he "got it together" is to blame the victim.
Seems like he's still got some social problems--people trying to reach out and he says stay the fuck away from me.
New people, that I have not yet interacted with have the benefit of the doubt, but the bullies from yesteryear did not magically grow into upstanding and respectable citizens.
I'm still in contact with some people from my highschool but they're definitely very much in the minority.
And when somebody gets bullied and you are 'doing nothing but not talk to him' you are also letting the bullying happening.
Neutrality is not always an option.
In real life, we don't shake our heads at people who've been assaulted or had a swastika or cross burned in front of their house and say that they should try to manage social contact with others better. Instead, we treat the oppressors as the criminals they are.
Is. Not.
I don't understand why this is so difficult. :(
That's not the behavior he was upset about. Speaking personally, I'd have been ecstatic if people not talking to me were the worst I had to put up with in high school, and I had it a lot easier than he did, from his description.
And I think coping in a Lord of the Flies like environment is part of being human. We can not easily extend the adult civilized structure into childhood. Only in extremely tightly controlled environments does that sort of work.
Civilized society is spontaneous, and pops into existence whenever two people meet in the wilderness.
Both prisons and schools only come into existence when governments create them.
Are you sure? I am pretty sure there have been extensive studies on tribal groups all over the world that would disagree with you.
Also I think part of the success of Lord of the Flies was because it struck people as a realistic account of what would happen in that situation.
Correct. During the time when he was learning social skills, he was taught that all social contact was negative.
It's clear from the essay that this bothers him 25 years later and it should.