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Ai_Ling
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22 Dec 2010, 5:52 pm

So I was reading the book, "Aspergers and Girls" which is mostly giving advice to younger girls, Im 22. I dont know if any of u have read this book. I was reading the friendship, fitting in and bully chapter. I thought it was so ridiculous. It seemed that highschool friendships are so heavily driven by the nature of a clique? Not so much the actual connection between individual people. It seems so superficial. So in other words, if your a socially savy person and u wanna make a lotta friends. You just need to be able to work the system of cliques as opposed to making actual connections with people? For me, in highschool, I knew nothing so I was very oblivious to what was going on around me. I did notice that in order to make yourself known in the school, that could easily happen thru superficial means. Now as I remember being in college, even some of the clique dynamic still thrive on superficial means(tho its probably not as bad). You just learn in working to project a likable reputation within ur clique of friends. For me, I personally suck at that in trying to project superficial version of myself, like i practically cant do it. So unfortunately or fortunately Im stuck being myself. I perfer to connect with people on an individual basis. Connecting while you always see someone in a group, the connections almost never gonna happen for me. I was wondering, how prevalent is this superficial clique dynamic after high-school? What are your experiences? Where u able to navigate the system or did u just suck at it like I do?



IMCarnochan
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22 Dec 2010, 6:17 pm

I found that high school was like prison, everyone is forced to be there thus a pecking order is created. It can be like that depending on where you work after you are out of school, I have always found positions where I could be more or less alone and still get paid.



Who_Am_I
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22 Dec 2010, 7:33 pm

Cliques are teh suck. I can only interact with individuals.


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Peko
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22 Dec 2010, 8:31 pm

cliques suck
But I seriously think most kids shouldn't bother trying to REALLY make friends 'til college in most cases.


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grendel
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26 Dec 2010, 3:08 am

I think they are very prevalent into adulthood. I have been out of college for 9 years and at the two places I've worked since then (including where I am now) the work groups break into cliques. I believe it is a social principle (I don't remember the name) that when a group of people reaches a certain size they will feel compelled to subdivide into smaller groups. I am not somebody who could fit into cliques even if I worked hard at it so I don't really try these days. I try to work on individual relationships. I have had friends who were part of cliques and sometimes they tried to include me out of kindness but it didn't work very well and I didn't become part of it, just was uncomfortable and made everybody else uncomfortable too. Personally I would not suggest trying to break into the cliques... as you pointed out they are artificial and as far as I can tell not based on individual merit. When I've asked people who are part of cliques who I knew if they would hang out with some of the other people individually, the answer was no because it seemed like they might like some of the other people in the clique but not all of them and some of them they actually disliked, but they would go along for the sake of maintaining the group. It's my opinion that being part of this organization also seems to suppress people's individual good qualities if they have any and enhance negative and exclusionary ones. After all, a large part of the point of the clique seems to be to exclude people, then they can feel more solidarity with the other people in the group and together view the people not in the group as outsiders.
Even if I had an opportunity now to try to become part of a clique through an association with one of the members, I would not do so. I'm not saying this for "sour grapes" reasons. For one thing I am just very uncomfortable in groups especially the more people I don't know very well, but even when I like all the people individually and might get along with them one on one, when they come together they act differently and unpleasantly in my opinion and it's not enjoyable for me. I don't understand the common image of groups of friends where there are a few people and all of them are good friends with the others (unlike cliques). I haven't ever seen this in action, and I wouldn't' be inclined to involve multiple friends of mine in the same activities to form something like this because of the group dynamic behavior changes I've observed (I first noticed that with family members who were okay individually but not when they got together).
Another reason I eschew cliques and do not bother with them is, having felt like an outsider all my life and being quite familiar with being excluded, I find the whole concept cruel because there are always people who aren't in the cliques and they float around on the outside... I know what it feels like and I wouldn't want to make their lives worse either even if I didn't want to hang out with them. I don't want to have the power of being in a clique or use that to get back at the nasty ones either... I really don't want anything to do with them. I'd rather find one genuine person and spend time with them alone doing something enjoyable. Of course, the search goes on for that person. One friend I had recently got absorbed into a clique at work and now we do almost nothing together, though she professes to hate the idea of cliques and acts like I'm a much closer friend than any of those people... so I'm feeling a bit personal about cliques at this time.



Musicprophets
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26 Dec 2010, 8:32 am

well when i entered college, i was naive to believe that all that clique BS would go away. Being around all new people from all over and there for the same purpose to recieve higher education, i believed everyone would be ready to just forget and move on from their high school personas, etc. I was wrong of course. It only seem to intensify with 20,000 plus people around me. Looking back, i made some mistakes and some of the blame can naturally lay on me for my rather crappy time in college. In my workplaces over the years, the clique is still there. it seems to me workplace friendships are very superficial and if a friendship ever gets anywhere to any real mutual concern/respect level, it takes a very very very long time at least a year or more. But since everyone assumes everyone has their own friends, some people are too busy or not interested in making new friends. so that sucks for the person wanting friends. and in order to make friends in a workplace, you do have to start out being as superficial and cliqueable as possible. You must fit the clothes, the language, the pop culture references (even if you think they are sh***y pop culture references) always be texting during your breaks, smoke cigarettes, get drunk, b***h and moan about your sex life, b***h and moan about your sh***y bf/gf, and basically act like everyone wants to be like you. this applies to both young men and young women of my generation. And if you are not good at any of that or if you come off strange and aloof, then you will be ignored and marginalized to the creepy column in the friendship world. great job adults! that college degree just made you a shallow conformed overrated as*hole.



grendel
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30 Dec 2010, 3:20 am

Well, I don't think the college degree makes people any more cliquish than without, I just think that cliques are prevalent in every area of life and honestly I think they are a product of most people's nature. Some more than others. But the good news is, there are always a fair number of people besides myself (whether or not I particularly like them), that don't manage to or don't want to be in cliques anyway. And sometimes there are some people in cliques who are nice if you get to know them outside the clique. Just don't try to be part of a clique, it just makes people act more fake and you don't get a real connection with anybody, just erode yourself.