Wish We Had Younger Members

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

I love this forum, but the one thing I wish we had is a few ("few" being key, there) younger members. And I don't mean 20 year olds, I mean high-schoolers. I think it'd add a nice, different perspective to things. We had an active one a while back, I think he was 14-15 (I forget his name, honestly), but he wrote more like a 30 year old than a teenager.

Of course, I have no clue on how to get younger members here. And those ones asking us to do their homework definitely do not count.

[Charles Darnay]

There are a few running around here

[Trask]

Do I count? I'm 17

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Your intro is what inspired this post, Trask. And yeah, you count. :)

[Trask]

Thanks :)

[SilentMute]

There are some younger members on the forum, but you forget what the workload is for a high schooler. I have several teenage friends on my Tombraider forums, and for most of the year I barely hear from them. Not only do they have tremendous loads of complicated homework, they also tend to be involved in extracurricular activites like drama.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Oh, I don't think a lot of students are THAT overworked.

[Calidore]

Oh, I don't think a lot of students are THAT overworked.

There's the work they get and the work they do. Ne'er the twain shall meet.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Exactly.

[Varenne Rodin]

The ones with literary interests are probably working on studies, reading books. I might have used this forum years ago, if I had known of its existence.

[JuniperWoolf]

We used to. The one you're thinking about who was 14-15 and wrote like a 30 year old was probably Daniel, and Heathcliff was 13. I think Pensive joined when she was 11 or something too. I've noticed the lack of teenagers too lately.

[Lokasenna]

We used to. The one you're thinking about who was 14-15 and wrote like a 30 year old was probably Daniel, and Heathcliff was 13. I think Pensive joined when she was 11 or something too. I've noticed the lack of teenagers too lately.

Oh dear, that seems to imply we're all getting old together... Not long before this becomes an online convalescent home, eh?

[MarkBastable]

Oh dear, that seems to imply we're all getting old together... Not long before this becomes an online convalescent home, eh?

How I wish one could convalesce from age.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

We used to. The one you're thinking about who was 14-15 and wrote like a 30 year old was probably Daniel, and Heathcliff was 13. I think Pensive joined when she was 11 or something too. I've noticed the lack of teenagers too lately.

Actually, I was thinking of cl154576, unless his real name was Daniel ( I don't remember a poster with that name, actually). I forgot about heathcliff, but I don't think she's active anymore (and I think she was mostly involved on the game forums). I didn't know that about Pensive, though.

[Paulclem]

One of the interesting things about the forum is the democratic nature of it. It doesn't matter how old you are, what gender, what you look like, what coutry you come from, what clothes you wear, what your job is etc etc everyone can talk on a level playing field without those other impressions intimidating or distracting the poster.

[SilentMute]

Oh, I don't think a lot of students are THAT overworked.

I find that is the common quote of people who forgot what it was like in high school. Myself, I'm 37 years old--but I haven't forgotten the ridiculous expectations they had. I got up at five in the morning for a two hour bus ride, unable to eat breakfast at that time of morning. I had seven classes, and each had two hours of homework each. Inevitably, all the classes had tests on the same day or projects due the same day. Then they demanded that we get a certain amount of volunteer hours in during the year, and that we were involved in one extracurricular activity. I didn't get home until five o-clock, and I didn't get done with my homework until 2 a.m. I am generally an organized student, and I had maintained until high school a 4.0 average. Staying home sick for one day got you horribly behind.

Of course, I was in the IB program--and maybe many of my young friends are in honors programs...they are certainly smart enough. It seems to me that these honors programs try to teach you everything you were supposed to learn the first eight grades, and then they try to teach you college courses too. In the end, it didn't seem to give anyone the advantage that was promised to them.

As for the work high school students are assigned and the work they actually do--the only way you can actually manage to get through school is to half-a** it.

I find most adults seem to believe they are the only ones with responsibilities. Many young people have responsibilities--often because their parents delegate their share. With me, I had to help take care of my mentally disabled stepfather--and that was A LOT to handle. Too much in the end to handle with high school, so I dropped out and got my GED.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

When I was in high school, the vast majority of my time outside of school was spent playing video games and hanging out with friends. I particpated I'm a couple non-curricular activities, but not many. I was a reasonably good student. I found that almost all the students whose time was almost exclusively preoccupied with school were in such a situation because they chose to be.

[stlukesguild]

Seriously, I don't remember high-school being at all that difficult... and yes I maintained grades near the top of the class. We were expected to read a great deal... far more than what I have seen required in high-school and even college courses today, but for a bibliomaniac like myself, that's not exactly torture. I have always had a mastery of note-taking and study skills and so I rarely put forth more than a hour or so in preparation for any test. I actually spent far more time most evening playing baseball, football, basketball, etc...

My art school experience was far more intense. My first semester involved 21 semester hours. I spent a great many evenings working well past midnight churning out the latest painting, drawing, or design project... to say nothing of essays for the survey courses on Western Art History and Western Literature. On top of this, I worked some 10-20 hours a week in the school library, as an Art History tutor, and as an Art History research assistant.

[Sancho]

Way back when on this web site we had a bunch of dedicated high schoolers - you know, dedicated in the sense that they weren't just looking for answers to their homework questions - anyway I found some of their stuff to be some of the best stuff written on these forums.

Does anybody remember Abdo Rinbo? That kid had a righteous imagination. He kept getting banned and coming back with a different alias, and then he went in and deleted most of his stuff. Anyway, he was responsible for me squirting Pepsi through my nose once or twice. I hope adulthood hasn't beaten him down to badly.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Why was ha banned? Was he too much fun for the forum? Sounds like something they'd crack down on.

[Charles Darnay]

Things got too personal. There was one particular,,,but that doesn't matter.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

I tried searching his name to find his posts but couldn't find anything.

[Trask]

When I was in high school, the vast majority of my time outside of school was spent playing video games and hanging out with friends. I particpated I'm a couple non-curricular activities, but not many. I was a reasonably good student. I found that almost all the students whose time was almost exclusively preoccupied with school were in such a situation because they chose to be.

This. I find life taken up by such trivial things as video games. That's what got me started on this forum. My friends are all obsessed with video games to the point of freaking out if their laptop is dead. As a result of this and my general lowered interest in video games I am soon getting rid of all of my video games and in the newly found free time I'm going to hopefully be more social and am going to get more into literature.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Video games are fine in moderation. I play them often, myself. Socializing and reading is definitely the better choice, though.

[Sancho]

Howdy, Trask. I like the way you put "more social" and "more into literature" in the same sentence. I sometimes worry that I’m somehow missing life by having my head stuck in a book, but it doesn’t have to be that way. The key is balance – each can complement the other.

As for Abdo…yep, he could be abrasive, but I sensed he had a razor-sharp wit. He reminded me of one of the kids in my neighborhood: everybody knows he’s either going to be a CEO of a Fortune 500 company or he’ll wind up on Cell-Block #5. There’ll be no middle ground with this dude – could go either way, you know, depending on the breaks.

(I guess it’s AbdoRinbo – all one word)

[SilentMute]

Everything can be a problem--even literature--if it is in the hands of a mentally unbalanced person...or a very intellectually undeveloped person. I know some people who get so wrapped up in the fantasy of their books that they can't seem to distinguish fantasy from reality. A book can be totally harmless--but a maniac can find inspiration to do homicide from it.

The same thing with video games. I play video games, but that is a small portion of my life. I read, study Spanish, do papier mache, chores, etc. I know the difference between reality and fantasy. Lara Croft uses 100 bullet to take down an enemy--but in real life it takes only one. There is no reset button in reality. Video games allow me to pretend to be in situations that good sense would not allow me to be in in real life. I would not, in real life, go mountain climbing period--and I certainly wouldn't go mountain climbing in a pair of shorts and sleevless shirt like Lara Croft. I've learned many interesting things about cultures from the Tombraider series, since it often uses myths. And actually it has also branched out in areas that encourage creativity. There are short story contests, art contests, costume making, paper making, free computer programs that allow you to make your own video games, etc.

However, I've certainly met my share of mentally unbalanced people to understand why there is a stigma against gamers. It is always unfortunate that the bad apples are always so good at calling attention to themselves and becoming the poster children.

Pepsi through the nose. Ouch! That is not fun! Burns like heck. Of course, what is really gross is when part of it goes up your nose, and then comes down your throat again. You burn your nose, and then you swallow snot-filled soda.

[JuniperWoolf]

I tried to find some posts from this AbdoRindo fellow, but all I could find was a very intriguing thread about him from 2005:


If you ever want to do some truly enlightening historical digging, familiarize yourself with a banned guy named Abdorimbo. He revolutionized this forum before getting himself ejected.


Searched for Abdorimbo and the only hit that came up was to this thread.


"Tis ABDORINDO...not Abdorimbo..

Give it another try..


I checked the member list, Ab's gone, as in, definitely.


As Jay said 'tis not exist anymore :)

Apparently, they erased all traces of him. Omg, omg, this is like an X File!

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Well, I don't know what they're talking about, because I found him (http://www.online-literature.com/forums/search.php?searchid=2486063) with an easy search. I can see why he got banned, especially his last post he didn't self-edit. I'm sure he was funny, but it looked like be just devolved into a complete troll, targeting one member in particular.

[MarkBastable]

Well, I don't know what they're talking about, because I found him (http://www.online-literature.com/forums/search.php?searchid=2486063) with an easy search. I can see why he got banned, especially his last post he didn't self-edit. I'm sure he was funny, but it looked like be just devolved into a complete troll, targeting one member in particular.


That link leads.....nowhere.....

...weewah weewah weewah weewah...

[Scheherazade]

~

Since Abdo is not a member of the Forum anymore,

we should not be discussing his actions or the reasons he got banned for.

Anyone who insist on breaking the Forum rules will eventually get banned.

~