I don't know. Maybe it's the complete lack of sleep last night, or maybe it's the continuous hours of Dragon Quest Monster Joker, but I'm not in the mood for school today.

[rant]

School is so discouraging these days. It's not about the homework, it's not about the classmates and it's not about the teachers. It's just school.

I've been sitting behind desks for over a decade of my life and I've got next to nothing to show for it. Sure I've learned some things, but what good are they in the long run?

Ultimately the goal is a diploma, but what is that other than a couple brownie points with employers? I'm positive the very diploma itself is entirely insignificant as I know it neither helps me while I'm working or any other time for that matter. The only weight it carries is the weight that deluded people give it who are slaves to the system of society.

It's against the law to skip school and it's against the law to disobey your parents (to a degree) so if you have inflexible parents and a shitty school, you're pretty much fucked for at least a decade.

The high school I'm going to, suffice to say, is superior to the few I've been to, as it's easy work and doesn't give out homework. Homework, after all, is also a kick in the face. Right when you think you're done with school, your grade haunts you even at home, begging you to finish that giant damn Civil War diorama, the incompletion of which threatens to fail your social studies course and repeat your grade.

Of course the easiness of the school is starting to turn on me. Mental exaustion from usual schoolwork is replaced by mental exasperation from the continuous urge to right in between the lines of the worksheet cursing the paper and it's creator's for giving high school students 2nd grade work.

My english class assignments are coming off of English-as-a-Second-Language website. I'm doing homonyms again? How many minutes ago did I last do this?

My science class is teaching how many centimeters can be found in a meter. That's not even science.

My social studies class is going over Mesopotamia again. AGAIN. AGAIN.

And don't get me started on math. The dumb pregnant girl in glass doesn't know what 4 plus 6 is and you're trying to teach us absurd equations that we will NEVER ENCOUNTER IN OUR NATURAL LIVES.

And wouldn't you guess it?

I actually do happen to know the difference between they're, their and there.

There are 100 centimeters in a meter.

The rivers around the Fertile Crescent are called the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers

and did you know that 4 plus 6 is 10?

All of these questions I could have answered years upon YEARS ago. And I'm being asked these now. I thought school got more challenging? Or am I confusing that with repetitive?

I ask for something NEW and USEFUL and they give me an hour to sit on my ass and stare senselessly into a book which we'd be graded well in doing it even if we didn't read a single word. What's that teaching? Where's the lesson in that?

Find a newspaper article and write about it? What does this teach us? "Comprehension and Response" you say? Will you give me an A if I laugh at the joke?

Draw the water cycle and hang it up on the wall? Haven't I done that ten times before? "Everyone's going at different paces" you say? Will you give me an A if I break the legs of a classmate and beat the pace he sets?

Define the word, 'artisan' and use it in a sentence? Can't you give me something somewhat challenging at least? "Don't be a smartass" you say? Will you give me an A if I define 'counterproductive' and use it in a sentence?

Find the determinant in a 4 x 5 square matrix? Why and what purpose does the determinant serve? "I don't know" you say? Well, can you imagine when we would ever use such an equation beyond the realm of being a math teacher or OCD mathematician? "No, I can't" you say? Well then you better change the damn lesson plan now should you!?

I appreciate education for what it's worth. But I don't appreciate school. It's ruled by beaurocratic dipshits who look at the world through a toilet paper roll.

The United States government figured it couldn't learn from students enough from one test in a monopolized school setting so now we have over a DOZEN identical state required tests to take, all of which take up valuable time, money, paper, pens, patience and an immeasurable level of stupidity.

My natural rights are being encroached upon! The moment you are born in this country, or any country for that matter, your rights are encroached.

First they label you. It doesn't matter if you don't want to be called Dick or Martha, that's too damn bad, you're most likely stuck with your mundane name for your whole life.

Secondly the paperwork is filed. Isn't that sweet? With every cute baby newborn that enters this world, a bunch of self-imposing officials and their stupid legal documents force little Charlie here into a lifetime of slavery.

See, it all starts with school. School is where you're broken in. Say goodbye to your days of play because when Kindergarten rolls around, that's when you start to lose touch.

You've inherited a humongous responsibility which you're expected to uphold. Whether you want it or not is not up to you and you'll be punished for shirking it.

Just like slaves.

And isn't that appropriate? Because once you've survived what seems like a lifetime of school horrors, be it mind-numbing labour for the satisfaction of the big boys upstairs or the brutal attempt at comformity to tackle the social status setters, you're then taunted.

YES! High school is over! No more school! Hey, wait! College is even MORE important than high school and everyone says you'd be a fool not to go, so guess where you're headin' next!?

That's right, MORE SCHOOL! Except this time, the teachers won't take your shit and you have to PAY THEM to do it! Isn't it grand!?

Oh, and you thought I was saving the best for last? Well, you got me, I have and it's just this: throughout the entire hellish experience you'll be molested into thinking that it's you're life long purpose and dream to GET A JOB.

Oh! Is that not brilliant or what!? See, you've known it ever since you were a child! You wanted to grow up to be an accountant! Isn't that sweet? But unfortunately for you, you're going to find that the accounting firm you work at isn't all it's hyped up to be and you'll discover that a misguided sleazy boss and a desk job don't match, so you're going to take a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT ROUTE and fullfil your other lifelong dream of having an exciting career as a Paralegal!

Doesn't that sound like fun? Isn't that just a feather in your cap?

Don't you feel proud when the teacher asks you what you want to be when you're older that you tell them you REALLY, ACTUALLY, SINCERELY want to be a Paralegal?

When they ask about you're hobbies, you'll be slick and smooth when saying "Nay, kind sir, I haven't the time for hobbies. Now if you'd excuse me, I'm late for my daily tux cleaning have yet to iron my balls."

Son of a bitch. More people shoot themselves in the head before they realize what's going on here. Of course the reason for that is because they know very well that it's the quickest way to intoduce something new and useful to it.

Suicide jokes aside, I'm sick of school. I want out. I know! I'll test out! I'll take my GED! "That's several hours of schoolwork and 75 bucks out of pocket" you say?

Well you can kiss my ***** ass.

[/rant]



Well. Looks like it's about class time...



((Post the source of the quote for a rep point.))

I have an honest question for you: Mesopotamia in 10th grade (IDK)? We learned about it in 6th and 7th... then again...

I've done Mesopotamia as early as 5th, 6th grade, maybe sooner.

Anyways, I agree with you. What's the point of spending 16+ years in school (including college) when you could be getting a real job. I mean, if you can't get a good job, even after college, then you're a busboy at Denny's, all the dishwashers will make fun of you "Oh, look at college boy. djfl;kadgkldfbf;afjdkfadfsf.". And if you spend 25 years of your life going to school/getting ready for school, that leaves you with 50 years left (give or take a few) in your life. And why are we going to school? Oh, this is a triangle! HOW THE FUCK WILL THAT HELP IN REAL LIFE?!?!?!?!!? Very few people will become engineers. I mean, really. If they want to learn that shit about angles and stuff, then make a seperate fucking school for them.

Exactly what I'm saying. Also, shouldn't school be illegal? I mean, they're holding you there AGAINST YOUR FUCKING WILL. You spend so much time there, and you sit there, staring at a fucking chalkboard doing nothing. It's bullshit. You spend 5 hours a day on homework, 6 hours a day at school, and 10 hours a day sleeping. That leaves you ONE FUCKING PRECIOUS HOUR where you can do anything you want. And then you have to sit through lunch, where they give you an hour to eat, with the shittiest-tasting food ever, and the chicken nuggets bounce, and you finish your raw lunch in 10 minutes. I'D RATHER TAKE 50 MORE MINUTES OFF OF THIS HELL THAN 50 MINUTES TO SOCIALIZE AT A TABLE OF FIVE ENEMIES!!!!!!!!!!!!! And then you realize that you're labeled with "nerd" or "jock" or "weirdo", and that's just retarded. It's sort of like that DRY CLEANER BEING SUED FOR 500 DOLLARS FOR WASHING A 50 DOLLAR BILL IN THE WASH. IT'S TOTAL BULLFUCK. And then you have to eat, sleep, and be "happy". Time to face it, people are more like robots than actual FUCKING ROBOTS.

I'm pleased to hear someone agree actually. All too often I hear, "suck it up" or "we all have to do things we don't want to do" when I really DON'T have to suck i up and I SHOULDN'T be forced to do things I don't want to do, unless such things include me stopping something I'm already doing, like smoking or doing drugs or something.

Learning to 'find the determinant' is so far the most brutally absurd thing to attempt to learn in school. And I'm not particularly fond of math class in the first place, in fact if I'm ignoring any of the mathematician crap they're trying to teach me then I've officially learned nothing new academically in the past 6 years of school.

Since not everyone knows what I'm talking about, allow me to elaborate. To find a determinant, one must have a matrix, take this one for example:



This matrix could easily be representative of the average payout per hour at a garage sale, X being sales in dollars over a course of 3 days and Y being 3 different products. Now we must find the determinant. What's the determinant? It's a seemingly arbitrary number that can be gleaned from any matrix by applying a complicated equation to find it. What's it's purpose? What does it mean? Well let's find out. The following equation is the tested work-proven 'minor form' solution to the third-order determinant of the above matrix in it's simplest form:



Now what does this number mean? Absolutely nothing. I badgered my teacher about it for days and she openly admitted she couldn't think of a single occupation in which we would need to know it unless we planned to become either math teachers or OCD mathematicians.

So this doesn't teach us anything. Just the arbitrary way to find an arbitrary number with absolutely no bearing on the purpose of the matrix. So why the hell LEARN IT!?

BUT WAIT! That's not all! There's actually TWO METHODS to finding the exact same useless number! And you have to know them both for the test!

Most stuff you learn in school (mostly history and math class) you'll never use in your life ever again.
On history, if I really want to learn about it I can turn on the History Channel. Math, all I need to know is how to add and subtract. Multiplying and dividing are basically the same as +-. :\ When will I ever need to know that |-3| = 3?
Okay, -3 is 3 spaces from zero. Can anyone guess what |-129| is? Seriously?

Yeah, that's also useless.

It's times like these when I can't help but feel compelled to spite the work. When it asks to "find x" I draw an arrow pointing at the letter in the equation. When it says to "evaluate" an equation, I look at it and write, "it is an equation".

I don't want bullshit, so I won't put up with bullshit schools, but if I have to, I won't put up with bullshit assignments. Contrary to what people think I'm against things on principle, not because I feel like being a hard-ass.

I'm not really fond of school, the people inside the school, and I'm not really fond of the teachers and the subjects they teach, unlike some people, since most of the stuff they teach are just plain drivel.

School's bad, but it could be much worse.

You could be out there, fighting a war, or you could be a starving person at Africa.

The only thing you can really do as of this moment, is make the best of school, and the environment your in, even though school sucks horrendously, and there's little to make the best of.

Worst things aside, to me, school shouldn't be mandatory, school should only teach you what you need to know, and the school should crack down on the bullying and stupid stuff students or teachers do to each other and punish them so that they won't pull that crap again.

I want to know about your thoughts about this however, on how the school system should be reformed so that it won't be bullshit anymore.

Ha! Get this, this is 100% true:

Last year as an independent study assignment which I convinced the assistant principal I could do, I compiled an ENTIRE 100 page powerpoint presentation with layers upon layers of shifting text and images including rulebook excerpts, student testimonies, statistics and interviews.

The powerpoint was HUGE and I was making sure to incorporate criticisms on EVERY SINGLE MOMENT of a typical school from when the bus arrives at the stop to when it drops me off.

I railed on rules, I bludgeoned individual schools across the nation, I had even snuck my way into a private academy with the pretend purpose of scouting for a good school to enroll in, it wasn't after I got thrown out that the single student I spoke to that entire time blatantly said to me "catholic school sucks".

I had typed it all up, what sucked, what REALLY sucked, what sucked so bad it was nigh incomprehensible and in every instance provided efficient time and money and brainpower saving alternatives and guess what?



It was essentially rejected on the grounds for being too long.


EDIT: The assistant principal just completely stonewalled me and said I had to cut it down by at least 85% for it to be acceptable. Ultimately I refused on the grounds that 'saying any less would be to omit truth' (quoted from 'Earthlings'). Supposedly, if she went through on what she was threatening me with then I failed the entire grading period as a result.

I am quite sad that you were basically stonewalled by your assistant principal, who refused to acknowledge your hard work on what was needed to improve the school system, because it was too long.

I just hope that one day, the school system would improve so that it doesn't suck anymore, but that's just a far-away dream.

I should look to see if that powerpoint is still saved somewhere on the school computers.

Holy Jeez.


The teacher announced that we'll start "learning" about plate tectonics in some new books we got.

I groaned and asked, "Agh, can't we try learning something we haven't gone over 40 times before?"

"Well I don't know what you've gone over 40 times before."

"We've gone over THIS 40 times before."

"Well this is mandatory of high school students."

"I think it was mandatory of MIDDLE SCHOOL students. I mean, I don't know about them, but I've gone over all of this already. At this rate we'll be talking about how the different plates rub together........ about how that creates earthquakes....... and how that makes earth vents and volcanoes......."


I opened the brand new books that came in just moments ago and looked inside the chapters were exactly as follows:

Plate Tectonics

Earthquakes

Volcanoes