So my resolve not to waste time on LJ lasted a grand...two days. Whoops. XP

[marguerite_krux]

At the ripe old age of 20, I am wondering what the hell is going on with today’s youth. Muck Up Day is BRUTAL this year. Kids rampaging through rival schools, through the streets, jumping on cars, smashing things up, bashing other people up- and OMG THEY MADE BOMBS. Okay, more like incendiary devices intended to cause smoke or fire. So…not exactly Al-Qaeda. But still, we have Year 12 psychopaths-in-the-making. Whereabouts does bomb-manufacturing fall in the homicidal triad?

My own Muck Up Day- or ‘Celebration Day’ as it was renamed by the principal, so as to encourage responsible and mature behavior rather than rowdy rambunctious revelry- was fairly tame. We were all too lazy, to be honest, and couldn’t be bothered with the usual pranks. No fish oil on the lockers, no Vaseline on doorknobs, no plastic wrap over toilets and no rotten egg-throwing. How boring were we?! There was a barbecue in the morning and a concert in the afternoon, during which nobody was injured and no condom balloons were tossed around. I was nominated for ‘Most Likely to Become a Millionaire’ but lost to Sining, a 15 year old Asian kid who was the Dux. Grr. *glares* 

A rather blurry photo of a few of my classmates:

 

Katie as Britney Spears, Jess as Red Riding Hood, Mel as the Big Bad Wolf, Laura as Dorothy, me as…well, I wore the tackiest thing I could find- given that Muck Up Day traditionally encourages a sluttier mode of dress- and since it had an Oriental look to it, I called myself Mulan…Emma as Snow White and Leah in the front as a character out of a book on our reading list.

Our outfits were more along fantasy lines, rather than following the balaclava clad hoodlum theme, lol. Ah, the innocence of 20005.

The scary thing is that I read about Muck Up Day antics in the paper and scoffed at it from a safe detached distance but then I was talking about it with friends and family and heard stories that hit closer to home.

Some kid broke into my old high school, didn’t realize he’d set off the silent alarms- or was too drunk to care- and the security guards caught him literally with his pants down, urinating on the principal’s desk! *facepalm* Omfg, the moron. That was awful but kind of funny, you gotta admit.

This, however, isn’t- some kid, also from my old school, made a bomb. Seriously, wtf? We don’t need religious extremists to take us out, it’s our own youth who’re going to manage that just fine in the future. And? A teacher at my mother’s school was attacked by students from another school while she was on duty in the cafeteria. She wasn’t seriously hurt, they shoved her around but didn’t full on bash her or anything, BUT STILL. It’s awful enough it happened at all, but to know that my mother was on duty earlier and that it could have been her…ugh. *shudders*

I’m not pretending kids in my day never pulled stupid stunts but they certainly didn’t go around bashing up teachers. A group of girls- GIRLS FCOL- seriously injured a principal when he got in between them and their target, a female student at a different school- they broke his frakking ribs. That’s just so scary. Before, you could count on teachers for safety if you were being bullied, but now that their authority means NOTHING to these little monsters, what do you do? I’m so glad I’m not at high school anymore. 

 

Comments

[reiko-afterglow.livejournal.com]

Girls are more horrible than boys these days, I find. :o

And forgive me for being naive, but what exactly is muck-up day? Never heard of it in my corner of the world.

[alyssa22.livejournal.com]

Precisely. I've had taxi drivers tell me they won't pick up groups of girls who look drunk because they're more likely to throw up in their cab, be obnoxious, and try to do a runner without paying the fare.

Muck-up day is the last day of school for year 12 students before their exams. It seems to be getting worse as the years go on. The worst thing we did at my school was put glad-wrap over the toilets so people would pee and it'd splash back up at them, and put vegemite on the toilet seats so they'd get black, sticky butts! Yes, we were inventive. Oh, and we turned our school sign upside down and filled the principal's car with screwed up newspaper. All pretty tame stuff...

[borg-princess.livejournal.com]

Tame, but cool! You guys showed initiative, damn it! Who had the guts to break into the principal's car, zomg?!

My year was so lame...but I think the teachers appreciated the reprieve, ha.

[alyssa22.livejournal.com]

His daughter was a couple of years below us. She gave us his keys, and gave us one of his purple ties to fly from the aerial!

[borg-princess.livejournal.com]

Hi!

And yes, it seems there is no longer a gender divide in terms of violence and abuse, my god. I totally thought it was a group of boys that had beat up that principal because you almost expect that aggression and impulsiveness from testosterone-driven young men, but girls? My world view has been shattered. :O

forgive me for being naive, but what exactly is muck-up day?

No forgiveness necessary, there's no reason you should have heard of it before, I think it may be just an Australian tradition.

Muck Up Day is the last day for Year 12 students, the final level of high school. It's around the end of October, just before they leave for study week and then exams. A time of high emotion and stress and drama because- they're leaving high school forever, leaving their friends and peers, and while people may relish being free at last, there's no longer that safety net, they've gotta face their future and figure out where they're going to go, what they're going to do...

There's usually a barbecue in the morning for the students and their teachers, there's a lot of photos being taken, shirts being signed...I still have mine, though the ink's faded after three years, lol. Then the kids are dismissed to get ready for the afternoon celebration- we get dressed up in crazy costumes, as you can see from the pic above, lol. Then there's usually a performance in the school gym- the students might put on a show, give out awards for 'Most Likely To...' and that sort of thing, but it's basically just music and dancing.

And there's more than you ever wanted to know about obscure traditions, heh. :D

Oh, btw, all this? Is what Muck Up's supposed to be like. It's controversial because kids use it as an excuse to get drunk and go around hell-raising with stupid stunts like trashing schools and attacking people. >_

[mcgarrygirl78.livejournal.com]

Kids are insane and high school is like the ninth gate of hell. If I was there now I would have to be home schooled. I dont know how a regular kids survives in that kind of environment. Muck up day used to sound like fun but these teens just dont know when to stop....they make something fun into something scary.

[alyssa22.livejournal.com]

Kids are getting worse because parents have no sense of discipline these days. Things have got worse, even in the past five years or so.

[alyssa22.livejournal.com]

I like your CM fics, btw!

[mcgarrygirl78.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much : )

I write for the reader almost as much as I write for myself and it gives me a real pride and joy that people read it and enjoy it. It encourages me to keep going. I appreciate the kind words.

[alyssa22.livejournal.com]

Keep up the writing!

I've recently discovered CM (only got into it in the last few months), so I was hunting around for things to read. It was a pleasant surprise to find there's a fair bit out there, given the show hasn't exactly been around forever!

[borg-princess.livejournal.com]

I don't know what you like to read, or have read already, but even though ff.net has a bad rep, there are some quality fics over there:
Prentiss Find (http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4343106/1/Prentisss_Find)
The Lion and the Antelope (http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4450753/1/The_Lion_and_The_Antelope)
Trusting in Change (http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4492028/1/Trusting_in_Change)
Vengeance (http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4495942/1/Vengeance)
Vengeance (http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4495942/1/Vengeance)
The Payoff (http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4204067/1/The_Payoff)
Kite Country (http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4130667/1/Kite_Country)