What was your experience going to a private high school in the U.S.?
My experience going to a private high school in the US taught me that money does not buy happiness or excellence. In some cases, it seems to purchase precisely the opposite.
This was extremely surprising news to me, because I thought that if a person or family had enough money, they could pursue more interesting or higher goals without the constant worry of survival. I did not grow up poor, exactly, but the pressure to race toward prestigious degrees and high-earning jobs certainly did a reasonable imitation of what it feels like to survive rather than thrive.
I attended a private high school in Southern California that was about 95% upper class white during the time I spent there. The kids of the C-suite executives of major tech companies were my classmates. Many of their families owned $20 million dollar homes on cliffside beaches in addition to ski resorts and other such secondary properties around the country.
The remaining 5% were either not white, or lower-middle to middle class, which was the demographic that I fell in.
The first thing I noticed was that precisely zero of the kids I met were genuinely passionate or enthusiastic about anything. The average conversation I heard fell into the following categories:
how to get an A in the class with the least amount of effort, including skipping reading assignments and bullshitting on tests and essays
how to bargain with teachers to negotiate deadline extensions (often for assignments they had plenty of time to complete)
where they were going to vacation next, or which expensive restaurant they wanted to try
the fancy new summer activity and/or internship that would add an eye-catching line to their college resume
The second thing I noticed was a pervasive “mental health issue” plaguing many of my classmates, so that I knew 14-year-old children who were seeing therapists and taking medical antidepressants.
This is what confounds me the most. What exactly do 300–400+ freakishly rich teenagers have to complain about, that requires therapy and antidepressant drugs at such a young age?
I prided myself on compassion, but I also must admit that I despised their emotional weakness from the bottom of my heart. I was a 14-year-old child, too. And it seemed to me that the pervasive atmosphere of faking, getting by, enabling incompetence and stupidity just because their parents paid $30,000+ a year in tuition stripped them of any opportunity to develop a rich identity for themselves.
In one year, the father of one of my classmates died from suicide/alcoholic overdose. Clearly, money does not buy happiness—going back to the overall lesson I learned from my four years of high school. The families of my classmates, flush with cash as they were, seemed set up for situations of depression, isolation and unhappiness.
School events were mostly attended by idle stay-at-home mothers with no career or interests of their own except cheering on their kids during sports events. The absentee rich fathers showed up every once in awhile. I swore to myself I’d never find myself in a marriage like that, and even came to admire my controlling mother just a little more than I used to, for the simple fact that she had her shit together and had an independent mind.
I tried to shield and isolate myself as much as I could during high school, because the lack of value for competence, skill, passion, or authenticity curdled my insides every second I breathed the same air as my classmates. I know that’s harsh, but I have zero respect for individuals who have every resource in the world at their fingertips, yet make the most pathetic excuses of themselves—not even managing a bit of basic introspection or self-awareness, let alone developing a unique worldview or highly competent skill.
The world attention right now is focused on the recent events between Gaza and Israel, as is mine. Over the years, as I read about the young people of Israel who outpaced their neighbors and even the world in technological innovation and military brilliance, I wondered what it would be like to grow up surrounded by such purposeful and intelligent minds. Individuals who are driven by fire, ambition, camaraderie, and a fundamental belief that they have agency over their lives and destiny.
I can imagine that they certainly do not take antidepressants and therapy when they’re 14 years old. They most probably do not spend their time thinking about how to game an already privileged system or make excuses to evade basic responsibilities. All of this despite growing up under constant bombardment and threat.
I know it comes from a place of privilege to say this, but I wish dearly that I had grown up in a meritocratic system that valued passion and competence, not money and fakery. I find that I spend a lot of time unlearning the lessons I unwittingly absorbed in such an artificially constricting environment. I’m so used to trying to hide myself, quieting my voice, and becoming invisible so that no one sees me for the misfit I am.
My goal, as it has been for many years now, is to find role models and peers who I genuinely respect, and relearn what it means to cultivate relationships on the basis of honesty and authenticity. I want to become extremely skilled at whatever I put my mind to and embrace the spirit of healthy competition rather than the stupid rat race I was taught to run in my childhood.
Many people say that high school was the best time of their lives, but I say that I pretty much died there and only began to resuscitate myself after I left.
Quora回答：你在美国上私立中学的体验如何？
版主： noles
