Phi thinks we don’t really know what happened. But it’s completely obvious to me.
This is why the concept of “dating market value” based exclusively on appearance is not only crap, but dangerous. Phoebe Prince was pretty. She apparently thought that ought to be worth something. Fat lot of good it did her. The guys she got together with either found or got back together with girlfriends, then turned on her, and egged on their girlfriends’ bulldog-faced girl buddies against her.
Seriously: If you’re in a group setting and you’re not already popular, do not bother with sex or anything sex-related. Don’t bother trying to look or act like someone anyone would want to have sex with, whether they’re popular or not, or you actually have the sex or not. You can’t handle the trouble that comes with attention.
The social world is about competition. Now, you might think that by being sexually attractive, you’re adding value to a situation, and people would be thankful and treat you well. You’re wrong. What you’re really doing is competing for a share of limited resources, and competition means conflict. Conflict sucks when you’re outnumbered.
Who do you suppose will take your side in the conflict? The guys you hooked up with? Wrong. Forget about any pleasantness after some other female attaches herself to them. How nasty they’ll be depends on her wishes.
But if you’re pretty, the guys you hooked up with will stay with you, right? Probably not. Life attached to an unpopular person really sucks. This is true regardless of the attractiveness of the person with whom you got together. So drop the little high school movie pipe dream about that unpopular guy with the heart of gold who worships you.
What about the guys you wouldn’t hook up with? You know better than to even ask. They’re mad. And now they know they don’t even have to be nice.
Your girlfriends? Let’s see, do you really have any? Of the women who’ll hang around you in any capacity: Do guys like them? Probably not, or there’d be that critical mass of at least two of you who looked good and had each other’s back, and you’d be popular. So why the hell would they stick their necks out to help you out of the trouble you got into because guys liked you?
This isn’t just high school garbage. This applies anywhere there are groups, anywhere being outside a group can hurt you. It happens at work, too. And it happens whether you actually let anyone touch you or not. If you say no, they’ll resent and retaliate. If you say yes, well, go back to the part about when they get a girlfriend. If you say no — same result with the later girlfriend. Especially if she’s management. How well I know.
And it’s not really about being loose or not. So stop trying to figure out how far Phoebe Prince went with whom at what time. Popular people do sleazy stuff all the time. Understand that it doesn’t matter what you actually do. “Slut” isn’t really a moral condemnation in that situation. It’s just shorthand for “You lost.”
To recap: Being sexually attractive does not get you power in a group setting. It is only for people who are powerful already. You’ve got no business with it otherwise. Dog yourself up, gain weight, and find asexual girlfriends to chat about TV shows with.
Do you think this applies equally to men and women?
Comment by SFG — April 27, 2010 @ 8:25 pm
Well, not in terms of punishment. There’s no penalty if a woman makes out with you, no matter how unpopular you are.
It might apply to men in terms of likelihood of ridicule for putting themselves forward. But it won’t lead to harassment.
Comment by stone — April 27, 2010 @ 9:12 pm
The guys she got together with either found or got back together with girlfriends, then turned on her, and egged on their girlfriends’ bulldog-faced girl buddies against her.
I might be the only one in the nerdosphere not following this story. Not to condone statutory rape, though HS senior + freshman doesn’t seem to me like something someone should go to prison for, is there evidence that the boys encouraged the harassment that drove Prince to suicide? It fits the patriachal narrative, and Pandagoners assumed that the boys were the drivers.
Do guys really turn on flings that harshly? It doesn’t seem that they’d have much reason to. It seems even less likely that were tight enough with their gf’s ugly friends to motivate them in a harrasment campaign. Possibly I’m being naive, but what people did to Prince fits girls’ style of social interaction more than boys’.
Comment by rob — April 27, 2010 @ 10:23 pm
Rob,
“is there evidence that the boys encouraged the harassment that drove Prince to suicide?”
Yes. It doesn’t appear they were the main instigators. But it happened with at least one of the guys’ (Muveyhill, the football captain) approval and participation (link here: http://www.wggb.com/global/story.asp?s=12285134)
“On the day Prince died, the documents describe how Narey, Mulveyhill and Longe had allegedly harassed her in the school library, where someone had written obscene insults next to her name in the sign-in sheet. Longe had allegedly called Prince a “slut” among other things while she attempted to study.
Mulveyhill and Narey had allegedly participated in taunting Prince, according to the documents, and engaged in a visible display of “affection toward each other in Ms. Prince’s line of sight as (Longe) taunted her.”
The three had allegedly continued their behavior toward Prince in the school auditorium at the end of the day, according to the documents, and Longe had kept up her alleged attack even after the girl had left school. As Prince was walking to her home on Newton Street, Longe allegedly yelled an insult at her from a passing car and threw an empty beverage can at her as they passed. The documents describe how Longe had laughed while Prince could be seen crying as she walked home.”
The media coverage seems confused about who among the perps were the boys’ girlfriends. Some writers seem to assume anyone who was harassing Phoebe must have been romantically involved with the boys; it may be the only way it makes sense to them. One story, here, http://www.irishcentral.com/story/news/periscope/phoebe-prince-bullied-by-two-separate-gangs-new-evidence-shows-89863757.html, has Longe being “a jealous former girlfriend” of that football captain, Sean Mulveyhill. I distrust this story because it concludes that she was not unpopular, but “too popular.” Which means the writer does not understand the dynamic of unpopularity.
A couple other stories have identified Longe as Mulveyhill’s current girlfriend, but this appears to be wrong. People Magazine said current girlfriend was an attractive thin girl (they had a picture) named Kayla Narey.
The second guy, Austin Renaud, had a girlfriend named Flannery Mullins who threatened Phoebe. There is no evidence I can find that Renaud was popular, just that he was older (18). He may have been a loser — he recently got arrested for drink driving. (here: http://wbztv.com/local/bully.suspect.drunk.2.1644047.html)
Comment by Sheila Tone — April 28, 2010 @ 8:16 am
“It seems even less likely that were tight enough with their gf’s ugly friends to motivate them in a harrasment campaign. ”
Right. But they’re motivated to keep their girlfriends happy, and the girlfriends’ friends are motivated to score points with the girlfriends. To understand the dynamic, it’s important to note the unattractive, overweight appearances of both Longe and Velazquez. They were girls who would likely not be popular in their own right, and might be tempted to cross lines to curry favor with popular people. I haven’t found a photo of Flannery Mullins, but Kayla Neary was attractive.
Comment by Sheila Tone — April 28, 2010 @ 8:22 am
The situation seems totally plausible. My problem is more with the chain of causation and blame for the intensity of bullying. When you said, “The guys she got together with either found or got back together with girlfriends, then turned on her, and egged on their girlfriends’ bulldog-faced girl buddies against her.” That mostly places blame and instigation on the guys, but it seems more likely that were tagging along to the girls’ campaign against a competitor.
The dudes are being charged with rape, which they wouldn’t be had Prince not killed herself, so it seems reasonable that they’re to blame to the extent that they harrassed her to death. I have a feeling that the girls were the instigated, drove, and were more enthusiastic in tormenting Prince. I also think they will get much lighter punishments, which does not seem just.
Comment by rob — April 28, 2010 @ 12:47 pm
Rob, when prosecutors run across an easily proven case of statutory rape, the guy is in a lot of trouble with or without a suicide. They’d be charged if Phoebe had turned up pregnant, too. Or if Phoebe’s parents got wind of it and the cops got a statement from Phoebe (which they sometimes get from girls who don’t realize quite how much trouble they’re getting the guys into).
Age of Consent laws are a subject of interest on this site. In what I would prefer the law to be, the kids would be charged with a misdemeanor or not at all (depending on their ages at the time the sex occurred). But the laws are what they are, unfortunately, and it doesn’t take a suicide for them to be enforced.
Comment by trumwill — April 28, 2010 @ 1:30 pm
I like Sheila’s writing, more please (she has some interesting things to say with a different perspective than most of the HBD-land blogosphere).
Re this post, although overall it’s a great response to the Phi angle on this topic, the advice (if not entirely tongue-in-cheek) of gaining weight/dogging out for greater invisibility isn’t the way to go. Ten plus years after the fact, other than the Reliving High School Trauama crowd, no one cares either way about teenage popularity or lack thereof (and you’ll lose touch with the relevant individuals anyway).
The amount of time and thought devoted to such alliances and politicking (in high school and otherwise) could be far better devoted to becoming more kickass in terms of business/professional/financial accomplishments (or athletics and other self improvement), and thus being less at the mercy of people’s whims as an adult. The best revenge is being in first while their fat asses are sweating it out in coach.
Comment by ABadPerson — April 28, 2010 @ 2:24 pm
Ten plus years after the fact, other than the Reliving High School Trauama crowd, no one cares either way about teenage popularity or lack thereof (and you’ll lose touch with the relevant individuals anyway).
Well yeah, but when you’re in high school popularity is The Most Important Thing in the World, and ten years is an impossibly long time.
Comment by Peter — April 28, 2010 @ 2:43 pm
Re “Well yeah, but when you’re in high school popularity is The Most Important Thing in the World, and ten years is an impossibly long time”
———————————————
Perhaps some people do think its important at the time but could this play into a lack of focus (Machiavellian high school politicking seems like a full-time job) making it harder for them to reach the goals that really matter in the long term?
Re Phi: Presumably there is an age (20s? 30? 40? older?) when one can let high school go.
Comment by ABadPerson — April 28, 2010 @ 4:21 pm
“Perhaps some people do think its important at the time but could this play into a lack of focus (Machiavellian high school politicking seems like a full-time job) making it harder for them to reach the goals that really matter in the long term?”
All of us nerds like to think that. But actually high school politicking isn’t that different from work politicking, and the skills they pick up do help them in the long term.
Who you are in high school is who you will be in life (though some people do manage to turn it around in college). Who ever said there was any justice in the world?
Comment by SFG — April 28, 2010 @ 8:45 pm
There’s politics in any organization, but since that’s the case, any high school kids reading this would be best advised to save their energy (and reserves of hypocrisy) for such time as when it really counts. In the Machiavelli analogy, there are many skills that a prospective prince should develop and courtier games are just one of them (the bulk of one’s time should be dedicated towards the military arts, so that you are not the one asking for resources, but rather the one that courtiers must play up to).
Comment by ABadPerson — April 28, 2010 @ 9:49 pm
Being sexually attractive does not get you power in a group setting. It is only for people who are powerful already. You’ve got no business with it otherwise. Dog yourself up, gain weight, and find asexual girlfriends to chat about TV shows with.
I forgot to touch on this. This is actually what my first flame Tracey did. She couldn’t handle the attention that guys were thrusting on her, so she decided to let herself go completely. It was a decision that she paid for for a long time. It wasn’t even successful at getting guys to stop looking at her. Instead, they just looked at her as an easy mark. And of course the weight, once put on, did not want to come off.
Comment by trumwill — April 28, 2010 @ 9:57 pm
First of all, I think there is a clear difference between girls and boys. Most girls who are attractive are popular. Girls who are realy ugly or fat are always unpopular. Beauty is by far the biggest factor of the popularity for girls. Men are helped by attractiveness, but being cool is much more important.
There are some exceptions though. Phoebe was a cute, although not beautiful girl,with a nice lovely mature body, whose cuteness threatened a group of girls. These girls therefore started to harrass her. I really feel Phoebe would have been much happier if society would have allowed her to date an older guy around 25 who would have apreciated and cared for her. Men in their twenties are much better suitors for teenage girls because older men really love, cherish and protect teenage girls whereas teenage boys only want to have sex with them and dump them later. The bond between a young men in his twenties and a teenage girls is the bond leads to a strong marriage, family and a happy life. It is the goal of feminists to destroy families and replace them with the state, so that’s the reason why feminists have made rised the age of consent to 18. Thanks to feminism Phoebe is dead.
Comment by Gannon — April 29, 2010 @ 7:00 am
LOL, everything looks like a nail when you’re a hammer.
Phoebe is dead because pedos like Gannon can’t bang teen-agers! Of course!
Same-sex high schools would relieve a lot of the torment of high school and jr. high for many people, IMHO, especially “nerds”. I’m not saying they should be compulsory, but they should be an option that parents could consider.
In a same-sex school, girls like Phoebe would only be bullied by other girls, if at all, and not by boys too. That would cut down on the bullying by at least 50 percent.
Same sex schools would probably cut down on the teen birth rate as well.
Comment by Maria — April 29, 2010 @ 1:10 pm
Usually happens when you’re rich and successful and the “popular people” who tormented you in high school are working as clerks in dry cleaning establishments.
Comment by Maria — April 29, 2010 @ 1:12 pm
LOL, R-I-G-H-T. I have personal experience in this matter. That’s all I’m going to say though.
Comment by Maria — April 29, 2010 @ 1:13 pm
Re Maria: “Usually happens when you’re rich and successful and the “popular people” who tormented you in high school are working as clerks in dry cleaning establishments.”
Agree in principle, but it doesn’t have to be that much of a difference, nor a malevolent feeling necessarily (often one is sorry for them), just being happy with where you’re at.
Re Gannon: The word “creepy” is overused, but its apt in this case. Amazing how the followers of Roissism in its various forms try to turn everything into a call for adherence to their doctrines (often coinciding neatly with their self interest).
Comment by ABadPerson — April 29, 2010 @ 2:23 pm
“Phoebe is dead because pedos like Gannon can’t bang teen-agers! Of course!”
Answer: I’m not a pedo. I’m only interested in fertile bleeding females with lovely curves. Hint: most girls above the age of 14 fit that description. Most spinsters over 30 don’t.
Oh, and I have made love to a few lovely teenage girls. All above age of consent. Just not feminist US age of consent, because I have lived in a lot of different jurisdictions, but always respected the national and natural law. A country (US) in which sodomy is considered the highest human virtue and good men looking for a wife are demonized is in decadence.
And I believe if that Phoebe would have had a loving and caring twentysomething fiancé instead of hanging around with teenage loser boys she wouldn’t have killed herself because she would have known true love,protection and affection.
“LOL, R-I-G-H-T. I have personal experience in this matter. That’s all I’m going to say though.”
If that was the case, you chose poorly, like the templar said at the end of the Lost Crusade(Indiana Johnes). But idealy, a suitor would ask the parents permission to date their teenage daugther. Teenage girls like losers and bad boys, but their parents have a much better eye and should be involved in the courting process (with the girl having an absolute veto right like it used to be in Western civilization).
“Re Gannon: The word “creepy” is overused, but its apt in this case. Amazing how the followers of Roissism”
I’m not a follower of Roissy, I started to comment before him, but his opinions about HBD and game are correct. Roissy teaches men how to seduce women, which is a very useful tool for finding a wife and keeping her happy in marriage. Roissy’s focus however is on scoring the highest number of women,whereas mine is the evils of feminism which threatens the fabric of western civilization.
Comment by Gannon — April 29, 2010 @ 2:55 pm
Well too bad. In my book, you’re a pedo. BTW, I have an 11-year-old. If you came anywhere near her in five years, I’d stick a shotgun in your face.
Yes, the entire fabric of Western Civilization depends on the ability of pervs and pedos like you to bang teen-agers. We shouldn’t waste our time reading Great Books of the Western Cannon, we should just make it easier for pervs and pedos to bang teen-agers.
“Gannon’s” been chased off/shamed off of numerous blogs.
Comment by Maria — April 29, 2010 @ 3:14 pm
Sorry that should be “Great Books of the Western Canon” above.
Although a Western cannon would not be useless if you have a nubile teen-age daughter and some creepy Gannon-type comes sniffing around her.
Comment by Maria — April 29, 2010 @ 3:17 pm
“In a same-sex school, girls like Phoebe would only be bullied by other girls, if at all, and not by boys too. That would cut down on the bullying by at least 50 percent. ”
No, the share of time for harassment remains the same, so the girls would just expand their efforts to fill it. I went to an all-girls school. It sucked.
And it’s not as if there aren’t still issues with boys — they’re just not there in the classes.
We had a lot of girls have babies, too. By a lot, I”m thinking 5 or 6 out of each class of about 95.
“Although a Western cannon would not be useless if you have a nubile teen-age daughter and some creepy Gannon-type comes sniffing around her.”
NPMP
Gannon’s got no reason to believe the dynamics would have been any better if Phoebe had been after 25-year-olds. I know he’s got this theory that adult men will treat teenage girls better than they treat women their own age, but I haven’t seen that borne out by reality.
Comment by stone — April 29, 2010 @ 3:38 pm
Well, thanks for that, but my experience was much different. The boy-bullying was MUCH worse for me than the girl-bullying. Also, my two older sisters who attended same-sex high schools had much more successful career and personal lives than I and my other sister who did not.
I also support school uniforms, as this would cut down on the bullying of students who don’t wear the “cool stuff” or can’t afford to wear it. (Of which I also had plenty of experience.)
Why would they? As adults, they have more power over a teen-ager (and really this is what it’s all about, unequal power relationships) so they would be more tempted to abuse their power with a child than with a woman their own age. Lord Acton and all that.
I “dated” a 23-year-old when I was 16. He bullied me constantly and used name-calling and “negging” to constantly make me feel like I was “lesser” than he was and therefore in his control (which I obviously, being a child, felt naturally anyways).
I’ve never seen Gannon post on any other subject except that of the necessity of allowing adult men to bang teen-agers. I don’t think he has any other interests, frankly.
Comment by Maria — April 29, 2010 @ 3:52 pm
A question for Gannon: if what you’re doing proposing is really ok with your conscience (and the parents of prospective high quality girls are down with it), and (as I think you have mentioned in your previous posts) you are in Latin America where the age of consent is like 12 in some places:
Why are you constantly seeking our approval in the blogosphere? (approval meaning validation that its good for the girl, will save civilization, etc). You say you’re not a Roissyboy, but you might as well be given your Spearheadish antics.
Comment by ABadPerson — April 29, 2010 @ 4:48 pm
“In the Machiavelli analogy, there are many skills that a prospective prince should develop and courtier games are just one of them (the bulk of one’s time should be dedicated towards the military arts, so that you are not the one asking for resources, but rather the one that courtiers must play up to).”
The analogy ends there. Machiavelli had a lot of good points about morality getting in the way of success, but high school kids don’t own principalities and can’t raise armies. They have to keep their peers happy, just like they’ll have to keep their peers and boss happy.
Comment by SFG — April 29, 2010 @ 6:47 pm
“but high school kids don’t own principalities and can’t raise armies.”
You know, that’s really too bad. Because if they could, life would be more interesting. And I’d be more inclined to read these posts about high school, eager to learn the latest about the War between the Principalities. As it happens now, I have trouble getting out of meta mode (i.e., why are Trumwill and friends, most of whom, I assume, are in their thirties — and don’t seem to have high school-age kids — talking about high school so frequently?).
BTW, high school kids under arms reminds me of the ’80s flick Taps. I remember seeing the commercial for it on TV when I was a kid. This one, actually. How cool that scene toward the end of the clip was, when the sheriff tries to strong arm Timothy Hutton’s character and all Hutton’s boys lock onto him with their M-16s: the ultimate in adolescent rebellion.
Comment by DaveinHackensack — April 29, 2010 @ 10:37 pm
Re SFG’s defeatism (potentially infecting the youth)
————–
Analogy = not literal. Analogy translation: Office politics isn’t the only route to economic success (and in fact is one of the most inefficient), figure out a clever way to turn your strengths into dinero and work around that which you’re not so great at. Now you’ll probably ask for recipes-for-success and I’m not providing that.
Or maybe I shall? In SFG’s case: marry a rich woman
Just kidding
(A really old rich woman)
Kidding, really…
Comment by ABadPerson — April 29, 2010 @ 11:31 pm
Rob, when prosecutors run across an easily proven case of statutory rape, the guy is in a lot of trouble with or without a suicide…Age of Consent laws are a subject of interest on this site.
I’m sorry I opened the door for the pedophile. Thank you Maria, for slamming it so hard. To clarify my position, I think sex between teenagers should be legal. I do not think that adult men should swoop down on junior highs, even though it will mean the end of western civilization. As a rough cutoff, it seems reasonable that high school students sleeping with each other should legal. I’m sure they’ll make dumb relationship decisions, but those are caused by both immaturity and inexperience. Delay the experience, and people will just make mistakes later.
Single sex education is one of those things where there’s no one-sized fits all. It would be cool if it could be predicted in advance for each kid.
Comment by rob — April 29, 2010 @ 11:47 pm
First of all, I think there is a clear difference between girls and boys. Most girls who are attractive are popular. Girls who are realy ugly or fat are always unpopular.
That’s one of those things that sounds true, but I’m not sure it is. I mean, it depends somewhat on how you define “popular”. If you define it solely in terms of the opposite sex, it becomes more true (or less untrue). But in terms of general popularity? I remember overweight girls who were popular just as I remember guys who were. There is a correlation, but it’s not as tight a correlation as a lot of people think.
Comment by trumwill — April 30, 2010 @ 2:57 am
Regarding whether or not 20-somethings would treat mid-teens better, I think that depends. I sorta-dated a 17 year old when I was 17 and sorta dated a 17 year old when I was 22. The latter got the better end of that deal.
The question, I think, is what kind of 20-something is interested in dating a mid-teen. In the United States, it’s a serious warning flag. In a society where such relationships were normal, it would be less so. But even if the guy means well, there are inherent problems dating across ropes.
Comment by trumwill — April 30, 2010 @ 3:01 am
I have trouble getting out of meta mode (i.e., why are Trumwill and friends, most of whom, I assume, are in their thirties — and don’t seem to have high school-age kids — talking about high school so frequently?).
I probably talk about college and immediately post-college more than high school, but I think the answer to your question is that they were our formative years. Important things were happening that we didn’t entirely understand. Exploring it with older eyes yields more interesting results than exploring with thirty year old eyes what I experienced with 27 year old eyes.
Comment by trumwill — April 30, 2010 @ 3:10 am
On the question of single-sex ed, I think it’s something that I would have benefited immensely from. I think. Hard to say for sure, since girls weren’t all that much a part of my scholastic experience anyway. I agree with Rob in that it’s one of those areas where hindsight is a very helpful gift.
Comment by trumwill — April 30, 2010 @ 3:12 am
“The boy-bullying was MUCH worse for me than the girl-bullying.”
Was it more like harassment? I’ve never experienced or heard of any boy-girl bullying beyond 6th grade that wasn’t sex-related.
I should also clarify, my all-girl-Catholic-school was pretty low-class, the kind of Catholic school which no Jews attended (that seems to be the tell for if it’s any good). But no girl ever *physically* threatened me in any way that caused me to seriously fear for my safety.
It might have been nice to actually have a physical fight, because those are winnable. Girls are more prone to, say, drop a book on your head from the overhead locker, then walk away quickly so you’re not sure who did it and they can claim it was an accident.
I don’t see this as just a high school issue. It’s not a dynamic that disappears when people are adults. It’s subtler, but it happens in college and work, too.
One of the problems is that it’s really rare to find a new situation to “start over” in where the other people there have to start over, too. When I went to college, most of the people I met were still hanging out with their high school friends.
At that job I posted about above, with the lech boss who turned me over to his new mistress, most of the other newish hires had gone to the same couple colleges and law schools. They were nice enough to me but I wasn’t protected by those cliques. So without natural allies, I stood out as an easy target.
Comment by stone — April 30, 2010 @ 9:54 am
Well, it was harassment that felt like bullying — maybe that’s the best way to describe it? The physical attack occured in the 8th grade, when a boy who hated me for no reason I can ever describe, threw a huge, hard, pebble-encrusted dirt clod that hit me squarely in the center of my back, while riding by on his bike.
My “crime” against this boy was pointing out that he had put his books in my locker on the day we were assigned lockers (they were the old-fashioned cubie kind with removable combination locks)and politely asking him to move them. His locker was right next to mine, and was no worse than mine in any way.
He harassed me for the rest of the school year.
There were other boys who wrote really nasty things about me and my best friend on the back wall of a grocery store that fronted a vacant lot (so the owners never bothered to paint the back wall.) They tricked me into giving them my phone number one day and then posted it all over that wall with my number, etc.
My experience is that boys are MUCH nastier at bullying than girls.
My one bullying experience with girls was this very fat, very homely girl named Cami who hung out on the fringes of the popular crowd (which shows that you don’t have to be pretty to be part of the popular crowd.) She wore expensive clothes so maybe her family was rich and that’s why they tolerated her.
She often said mean things to me (again I have no idea why) but she never did anything that approached the meanness of boy-bullying.
The rest of the popular crowd just left me alone, thankfully.
rob and “a bad person”– thank you for speaking out against that Gannon creep.
Comment by Maria — May 6, 2010 @ 11:50 am