Author Topic: PC108: The Goats Are Going Places  (Read 14452 times)

yicheng

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Reply #25 on: October 27, 2010, 04:06:05 PM
Caricature of a self-absorbed teenager gets the karmic repercussions of her actions through a little creative witchcraft, and in the end learns the value of friendship.  Everyone laughs.  Que the freeze-frame.  Roll credits.  Blah!  Huge miss for me!

As others have said the characters are unsympathetic, probably because they are completely one-dimensional cartoon cut-outs.  Jocks are morons.  Popular girls are bitchy.  Cheerleaders are apparently willing to make-out with anyone at the drop of a hat.  Granted, I was one of those all-AP-classes nerds in High School, and looking back I realize how completely oblivious I was to various socio-political dramas that my classmates had, but I just don't see what the fuss is about.  Nobody in my group of friends gave two beans about who was the most popular girl/guy in class.  Who spends so much energy on something so petty that only lasts for 4 years?  Why is it okay to make up all these cliques and stereotypes in high school, when in any other context it would be considered grounds for a class-action lawsuit?  Why jockey for the top of the hierarchy when the only ones that even cared are the ones you are jockeying with?



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Reply #26 on: October 28, 2010, 01:29:19 PM
Who spends so much energy on something so petty that only lasts for 4 years?  

A lot of people, unfortunately.  Every single high school based nostalgia movie does not help.  "These are the best years of your life," the saying goes.  Well, I'm glad that those did NOT turn out to be the best years of my life, because that would've set the bar pretty damned low.

Why is it okay to make up all these cliques and stereotypes in high school, when in any other context it would be considered grounds for a class-action lawsuit? 

Maybe high schoolers don't have quality lawyers?  Maybe because the ones on the top of the class hierarchy are minors, so there's probably not much that can done against them legally.  It's a very good question, honestly.  I hadn't realized how far I'd separated myself from that world until recently when I've heard several nears stories talking about extreme bullying of gay kids in high schools.  I have several gay friends, and their sexual orientation is a complete non-issue with everyone I'm around, so I'd taken for granted that this was generally the case.

Why jockey for the top of the hierarchy when the only ones that even cared are the ones you are jockeying with?

It's a self-perpetuating system, because the other ones jockeying for position have to show some respect for you when you're on top, or their power will be meaningless when they are top.  I think there's a "mob mentality" at work too--lots and lots of high schoolers think the clique systems suck, but no one feels like they can change it.  If you do stand against it, you become an outsider and are torn down that much more.  I'm honestly not sure how this could be changed--I'm not saying it couldn't be, but I have no idea how.



Wilson Fowlie

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Reply #27 on: June 20, 2011, 07:53:42 PM
Check out Lightning Eclipse from the Planet of the Goats

(You'll have to read the commentary below the picture to get the story of the picture.)

"People commonly use the word 'procrastination' to describe what they do on the Internet. It seems to me too mild to describe what's happening as merely not-doing-work. We don't call it procrastination when someone gets drunk instead of working." - Paul Graham