Material World- the social pyramid

Material World

I’m normal; at least I think I am. I not unlike any girl of my age. I’m defiantly not the prettiest, fashionable, liked, smartest, most popular, known, acknowledged or confident girl in my year; or my school for that matter. I’m the kid in the middle, the one that blends in with the crowd.

My hair is of a boring style, I have no distinguishing features, my clothes are from retail shops, my family are relatively sane and my grades are average. I am the sort of kid who goes to a school reunion ten years after she’s left leave and is approached by people who try to guess her name and gets it wrong every time. In short I’m in the background, I’m nothing out of the ordinary. I represent the majority.

What I don’t understand though is why the majority of us feel the need to fade into the background. The normal kids, us, out number the popular people by quite a ratio. So why are we all being pushed to the back of the line?

It is because we are living in a material world. A material world where our main focus is on what material objects we need, what we should look like to maintain a status. I do not think I am alone when I wonder why this is. Why is it so important for us to have that jacket or this game? Will it really make a difference, and why have we come to think like this? I think we all like to believe it’s not following the trend and that we are all prime examples of individuality but at the end of the day if you bought it in a charity shop, or if someone more popular than you say it’s stupid, it’s officially not cool.

I often wish that people would challenge these people, take a stand against the highly structured popularity pyramid that we seem to have built subconsciously. Ignore the fact that some of these people appear to have many friends and party every weekend and just say, ‘hey I’m me, and I’ll do what the hell I like.’ People act like they don’t care but I think deep down everyone worries whether people like them or why they don’t, what people do or do not think of them, why they don’t have as many friends as her or why they aren’t as funny as him.

It’s a fact of life that we all worry about these things. But I’m saying to you, ‘hey forget the people brighter, prettier and more popular that you. Just be you if people can’t like you for being you then quite frankly they are not worth your time. True beauty comes from within.

By Danielle Germany

Age 15