Popular cliques get a veto

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Hollywood teen flick clichés ring true even in real-life campus situations. Stereotypical campus cliques – the jocks, the cheerleaders, the nerds – hang together for ‘safety in numbers’ or to maximise their ‘impact.’ In the unspoken battle for popularity, teens try to acquire a more adult persona. However, a survey carried out by Girlfriend magazine reveals that teenagers believe it more important to be genuinely liked than just be the popular Big Man (or Woman) on campus.
Hanan Ahmed, 17, agrees and she’s been observing, “Each college has its own set of cliques. The popular ones go out of their way to seek attention. They are loud and they show off. Yet indirectly they’re seeking approval even as they project an image of non-conformism and they miss out on enjoying their teen years in most cases.”

“I know boys who date several girls just so they can talk about it later or who date older women to impress other teens. Those romantic relationships are not as much about commitment as they are about gaining the ‘awe’ of their peers,” she adds, “Some get tattoos, weird hairstyles or body piercings – it’s just an image they want to project. And you know what? Many teens do look up to them.”
Meenakshii Thakur, a 19-year-old student of Chaitanya Bharti Institute of Technology has a sneaking suspicion that the most popular kids are not necessarily the most liked, “Our college has students from all walks of life. Every teenager wants to be popular, but some want it at the expense of others. They are boisterous and hang out in groups. These students resort to attention seeking tactics like being loud and disturbing the class. They are plastic. This air of superficiality does not impress anyone.”
The survey cites 48 per cent of teens saying they were less happy than others. Is there a pressure to be popular in college at the expense of being happy?
As seen in cases of ragging, the inherent desire to be respected by the majority sometimes gets in the way of the teen choosing to veer away from the ‘mob’ and form real bonds with contemporaries.
Azhar Ahmed, 18, thinks, “There is a price to pay for this pseudo popularity and that is one’s individuality. Most guys in my college smoke. Some ride their bikes dangerously on campus, accelerating or performing wheelies in front of the girls. Some girls dig that guys perform these stunts in college to impress them, but then they cause more havoc. Using foul language to intimidate others is also quite common.”
As adult life looms, it’s reassuring to see that most teens would rather be liked for who they are than being in the ‘right circles’ by being ‘out of line.’

N. Kartik Rao
The Asian Age