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The School Survival Forums are permanently retired. If you need help with quitting school, unsupportive parents or anything else, there is a list of resources on the Help Page.

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To everyone who joined these forums at some point, and got discouraged by the negativity and left after a while (or even got literally scared off): I'm sorry.

I wasn't good enough at encouraging people to be kinder, and removing people who refuse to be kind. Encouraging people is hard, and removing people creates conflict, and I hate conflict... so that's why I wasn't better at it.

I was a very, very sensitive teen. The atmosphere of this forum as it is now, if it had existed in 1996, would probably have upset me far more than it would have helped.

I can handle quite a lot of negativity and even abuse now, but that isn't the point. I want to help people. I want to help the people who need it the most, and I want to help people like the 1996 version of me.

I'm still figuring out the best way to do that, but as it is now, these forums are doing more harm than good, and I can't keep running them.

Thank you to the few people who have tried to understand my point of view so far. I really, really appreciate you guys. You are beautiful people.

Everyone else: If after everything I've said so far, you still don't understand my motivations, I think it's unlikely that you will. We're just too different. Maybe someday in the future it might make sense, but until then, there's no point in arguing about it. I don't have the time or the energy for arguing anymore. I will focus my time and energy on people who support me, and those who need help.

-SoulRiser

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"Respect your elders"
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Avatar Korra Offline
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Post: #1
"Respect your elders"

What do you feel about young people being told "respect your elders"?
I usually hear this as a way to discredit my opinions because, "You don't have as much life experience as me," as if I couldn't possibly know more about or understand a topic as well as or better than them.

I also get confused by what definition of respect they mean/ what they're implying in general. Admiration, fear/obedience, pity, basic human kindness? If it's obedience, well, you can't just blindly obey someone just for being older.
As for pitying their fragility... That one makes some sense. Help them cross the street, be patient with them, etc. Though, that should be done for anyone disabled in some way.

If it's admiration, then an admirable thing all old people do is survive the thousands of ways they could die before getting old. That's badass, though the wisdom from life experience argument is likely what people mean here. I'd say not all experiences are good or learned from. I can admire and learn from experience and knowledge from any person regardless of age. Older people going through more on average could make someone more curious about them since they may know lots, but it shouldn't be a widely held expectation to treat them like they know everything or that their opinions are more valuable when they could easily just be ideals never questioned from youth.

I was looking through a debate on this and someone actually said that children were brain dead and teens were idiots (literally that wording). Noo The main reason seemed to be because we don't have enough "life experience" or do typical adult things like working full time and fending for ourselves.

How often do younger people even claim to know more about such experiences? Laugh Adults who say that seem to be implying that because we haven't gone through certain things that we know absolutely nothing whatsoever about life in any way, even though we have many basic experiences in common with adults: Making and losing friends, being stressed, being depressed, making jokes and laughing, comforting and giving advice, setting goals and working toward them, being responsible, making mistakes, etc.

It's not like our lives are a perfect fantasy world that goes to complete hell when we reach adulthood.

"I’M BEGGING YOU, PRINCE ZUKO! It’s time for you to look inward and begin asking yourself the big question: who are you and what do YOU want?"
" While it is always best to believe in one’s self, a little help from others can be a great blessing"
-Uncle Iroh(Avatar: the Last Airbender)
(This post was last modified: 05-03-2017 01:32 PM by Avatar Korra.)
05-03-2017 01:29 PM
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Gwedin Offline
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Post: #2
"Respect your elders"

how bout respect every1 til given reason not to ??

i didnt read anything except the title, so.
05-03-2017 03:14 PM
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Post: #3
"Respect your elders"

I don't know why but I feel this thread has been created before

RIP GWEDIN
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RIP NIGHT
RIP VONUNOV
RIP WES/THEWAKE
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05-03-2017 04:17 PM
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The man Offline
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Post: #4
"Respect your elders"

it's obedience

their pee should hv been shot out like a ki blast breaking the rocks

oh and also No one has any rights. We're free, rights create invisible restrictions. But we live in a society where the majority accepts rights to be true.
05-03-2017 08:04 PM
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Rule_BreakerXVIII Offline
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Post: #5
"Respect your elders"

Usually, the only people who go "respect your elders!! HURR DURR" aren't demanding respect-they're demanding total obedience; ergo, assholes.

I actually do respect quite a few older people. I just don't bow down and touch their feet as dictated by custom.

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05-05-2017 02:31 AM
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the Analogist Offline
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Post: #6
RE: "Respect your elders"

i feel like a lot of older people have made moral compromises for "survival" and their guilt or unexamined life needs protection from the probing of youngsters

Purity is to Believe only that which deserves it.
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05-05-2017 04:20 AM
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SoulRiser Offline
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Post: #7
"Respect your elders"

I'd much rather respect people younger than me than people who say shit like that.

"If you can, help others; if you cannot do that, at least do not harm them." - Dalai Lama
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05-05-2017 05:41 AM
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Post: #8
"Respect your elders"

Respect is earned, not mandatory.

RIP GWEDIN
RIP URITIYOGI
RIP NIGHT
RIP VONUNOV
RIP WES/THEWAKE
RIP USERNAME

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05-05-2017 06:13 AM
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TheCancer Offline
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Post: #9
RE: "Respect your elders"

I generally respect those who have lived a long time because I know how hard it is to make it.

If you want to be a different fish, you've got to jump out of the school.


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05-05-2017 08:24 AM
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Math_n_Logic Offline
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Post: #10
"Respect your elders"

The argument that somehow because one has a longer lifespan means that they are somehow more knowledgeable than you is quite ignorant because age really isn't a good measure for knowledge and wisdom... although good for generalizations.
05-05-2017 08:30 AM
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the Analogist Offline
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Post: #11
RE: "Respect your elders"

you've had more chances to take things in. doesn't mean you took advantage of those chances.

I used to tell my mom who'd tell me she'd done such and such for years. I would reply if you were doing it wrong all these years how does that experience count?

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Wisdom is to follow only the Opinion which makes the best use of evidence.
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05-05-2017 01:13 PM
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TheCancer Offline
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Post: #12
RE: "Respect your elders"

One thing about being human is that you know at best every other human shares the agony of the awareness that we are all biological entities, aging with certainty, suffering pain and sorrow and encroaching on our inevitable death. When I meet someone who has lived through 20 years more of it than I have, I respect that. Regardless if the other things they've done merit respect or not, simply surviving this existence day after day weeks to months to years to decade after decade commands respect from me. Because to me, to be human is demanding and exhausting. I respect it.

If you want to be a different fish, you've got to jump out of the school.


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05-05-2017 02:11 PM
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Post: #13
RE: "Respect your elders"

(05-05-2017 02:11 PM)TheCancer Wrote:  One thing about being human is that you know at best every other human shares the agony of the awareness that we are all biological entities, aging with certainty, suffering pain and sorrow and encroaching on our inevitable death. When I meet someone who has lived through 20 years more of it than I have, I respect that. Regardless if the other things they've done merit respect or not, simply surviving this existence day after day weeks to months to years to decade after decade commands respect from me. Because to me, to be human is demanding and exhausting. I respect it.

I see your point. Especially for those that lived in really horrible circumstances and were able to somehow get out of it. Those people really do deserve respect.

RIP GWEDIN
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RIP NIGHT
RIP VONUNOV
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05-05-2017 02:51 PM
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SoulRiser Offline
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Post: #14
"Respect your elders"

One analogy that I find amusing is when they say people should learn from their elders because "they've been around the block more times than you".

Why do they keep running around the same block all the time? I'd rather learn from someone who's been around more than one block. Preferably in a wider variety of places.

Edit: I would also much rather learn from people who are happy.

"If you can, help others; if you cannot do that, at least do not harm them." - Dalai Lama
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(This post was last modified: 05-05-2017 11:34 PM by SoulRiser.)
05-05-2017 11:31 PM
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Post: #15
"Respect your elders"

TheCancer sort of explained it. Actually, learning from successful people is a bit of a fallacy; it helps to learn from people who have failed as well, so that you don't do the things they did either. You have to hear from both sides.

RIP GWEDIN
RIP URITIYOGI
RIP NIGHT
RIP VONUNOV
RIP WES/THEWAKE
RIP USERNAME

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05-06-2017 05:34 AM
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Post: #16
RE: "Respect your elders"

I don't have to feel like I have to have something to learn from someone to respect them. I also respect youth as well agedness but sometimes for different reasons. I think life is hard for everybody. I don't really care what most people have accomplished unless it's especially exemplary. That pretty much excludes everyone I know. We're all mediocre and deserve respect anyway.

If you want to be a different fish, you've got to jump out of the school.


Captain Beefheart
05-07-2017 12:16 PM
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Post: #17
"Respect your elders"

We all provide the world with something.

RIP GWEDIN
RIP URITIYOGI
RIP NIGHT
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RIP USERNAME

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05-07-2017 04:03 PM
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Gwedin Offline
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Post: #18
"Respect your elders"

'cept those that don't
05-07-2017 04:29 PM
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Depression101 Offline
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Post: #19
"Respect your elders"

I feel like the people who have lived longer than me are just weaker than me; and, in time, I might prove to be weaker than them. To me, suicide is the most logical and brave option. Death, in short, is the surcease of all problems, worries, agonies, and everything else. When your dead you won't care about the hapiness you missed, because you'll be dead. It'll will be like going to sleep and never waking up: an eternal peaceful sleep. Hopefully without dreams. But the bravest of us take that chance of there being no dreams. Because the fear of that tiny chance that there may be something after death, holds us back. I won't live for my family, I never asked to be born and I have a right to take it back, no? And so what if I'll hurt them? They should be smart enough to realize this is what I wanted more than anything, and I won't care when I'll be dead; because I'll be dead.

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05-07-2017 08:56 PM
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Post: #20
"Respect your elders"

My views on death have drastically changed since high school.

RIP GWEDIN
RIP URITIYOGI
RIP NIGHT
RIP VONUNOV
RIP WES/THEWAKE
RIP USERNAME

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05-08-2017 03:01 AM
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SoulRiser Offline
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Post: #21
"Respect your elders"

Quote:Actually, learning from successful people is a bit of a fallacy; it helps to learn from people who have failed as well, so that you don't do the things they did either.
A lot of successful people tend to fail at a lot of things before they succeed (and also after), because they consider failure to be a learning experience.

"If you can, help others; if you cannot do that, at least do not harm them." - Dalai Lama
Help & Support - Get help with leaving school, unsupportive parents, and more.
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"Believe those who are seeking the truth. Doubt those who find it." - André Paul Guillaume Gide
"The true sign of intelligence is not knowledge but imagination." - Albert Einstein
"I'm pretty sure there's a lot of beauty that can only be found in the mind of a lunatic." - TheCancer
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05-08-2017 03:24 AM
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Depression101 Offline
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Post: #22
"Respect your elders"

That maybe so, but I'd hate it if mine did. A lot of my philosophy is based on The Stranger by Albert Camus. Great book -- read it if you have the time. It's short and sweet and nihilistic. Just the way I take mine.

"Then it was straight to the 40 ouncers/ slapping teachers and jacking off in front of my counselors." As the World Turns - Eminem.

"A man is a success if gets up in the morning and gets to bed at night, and in between does whatever he does what he wants to do." - Bob Dylan.

"A good artist should be isolated. If he isn't isolated, something is wrong." - Orson Welles.

"That is not dead which can eternal lie, and with strange eons, even death may die." - H.P. Lovecraft.

"I became insane, with long intervals of painful sanity." Edgar Allan Poe.
05-08-2017 03:24 AM
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RE: "Respect your elders"

(05-08-2017 03:24 AM)Depression101 Wrote:  That maybe so, but I'd hate it if mine did. A lot of my philosophy is based on The Stranger by Albert Camus. Great book -- read it if you have the time. It's short and sweet and nihilistic. Just the way I take mine.

I think your angst is too directional for you to be in the philosophical camp Camus created in The Stranger. In fact, taking The Stranger too seriously is actually ironic. The point of the book is there's no reason to have a philosophy.

If you want to be a different fish, you've got to jump out of the school.


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05-08-2017 06:34 AM
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Post: #24
"Respect your elders"

Perhaps one would then be interested in Titoism?

RIP GWEDIN
RIP URITIYOGI
RIP NIGHT
RIP VONUNOV
RIP WES/THEWAKE
RIP USERNAME

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Stop jerking off to porn and whining and do something about it

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05-08-2017 07:41 AM
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