Reprinted from Chumps on Parade (February 1998)
In the society that we live in today there are many different kinds of cliques. Each has their “claim to fame” but a common factor that is present in most of them is that they love to claim their independence from everybody else…in other words they want to be individuals. Don’t get me wrong though I think that everyone needs to be individual. If we weren’t the world would just be one big blob of sameness. But I really think that the word individuality is misused.
The main problem that I have with these certain “cliques” of people is that they try so hard to be “anti-society” and to be individuals that they fit our society’s stereotype of them absolutely perfectly, which they obviously don’t realize. Now I am really a hypocrite for writing this because from time to time I am sure that people have thought the exact same thing about me. This is just an outsiders view on the subject.
Let’s talk about the Hippies/Flower children, and the Goth population of society. The Hippies have their everlasting and ever present search for oneness with themselves. This constant self exploration and self expression is merely a way to draw attention to themselves as a minority. I mean they talk a certain way, act a certain way, dress a certain way all to be what? Free from the normal life of society? Free from the normal stereotypes that are associated with teenagers? Well they have really accomplished what they have set out to do haven’t they? They really are not any different from you and me. They still fall under the same prejudices that teenagers are faced with. They are still discriminated against. They are no different.
Then there is the Goth people who just try to…well they just try to scare the shit out of people by painting their faces white, putting rings underneath their eyes while acting very submissively. What does that scream out to me? It screams out “HEY LOOK AT ME I AM GOTH AND I NEED MORE ATTENTION THEN A 5-YEAR-OLD KID!” What respect does this really give them? None and they know it, at least not from their peers and adult figures.
Society is such a touchy thing today that we will never fit into it or be able to get away from it. Maybe my biggest problem that I have with these groups of people is that they simply try too hard. they pledge and preach self-righteousness so much that they come off to the majority of people as just a dumb teenager. And that is the whole problem that they are trying to overcome by forming these cliques! People think about society, they end up forming groups of people who are almost identical to them. They are laughed at. They laugh back at the people that are laughing at them and try harder to break away from them. They end up not changing at all and don’t realize it until someone or something slams it in their face. It is a vicious circle that will never be resolved.
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