my favourite song at the moment perhaps because i've been rather concerned about some matters recently.
one thing that has been on my mine constantly is what i perceive, perhaps, as anti-social and clique-ish behaviour. i've always been rather puzzled about the popularity and prevelance of the use of the word 'clique'. to me, clique is a word with a very negative connotation, has always been. the word refers to a narrow exclusive group of people, who do not readily include others. narrow, exclusive of people. notice that nowhere is there the usage of the word 'friends'. 'clique' brings to mind images of the "queen bee" and sorority girls, each trying desperately to be seen with the cool crowd in high school. those being in a clique to not have to be friends. infact, they do not even have to like each other. a clique simply refers to a group of people, on friendly terms or otherwise, who are quite reluctant to allow others in.
somewhere down the road though, the true meaning of the word has been distorted and now, it's morphed into a word that strangely enough, is used to describe a group of friends.
while it is only natural and instinctive to want to stick to one's own familiar circle of friends there comes certain circumstances that one will have to move out of one's comfort zone and interact with others - enrolling in a new school is one such event. desperately clinging onto one's cronies and refusing to involve others, citing them peculiar and unfamilarity as excuses; that amounts to anti-social and clique-ish behaviour.
what irony! for one who so vehemently wishes to be perceived as sociable to be engaging in such reclusive actions.
imagine the discordance and incongruence then, of one who declines to receive others, one who benefitted from the openess and warmness of such a person's group of friends. for if one follows such a line of reasoning - that peculiarity and unfamilarity of less intimate acquaintances is vindication of clique-ish behaviour - then accordingly, such a person should never have had a group of friend to begin with! because no one is ever born with friends. one has to make friends. 'make friends', not 'conjure friends', with the term 'make friends' suggesting that there has to effort involved, that people do not commonly become bosom buddies by some mystical force.
the clinging onto "friends", the enthusiastic re-telling of stories, interrupting others, with "i knows" or completing the sentence of others uninvited, the deliberate equivocating and speaking among themselve in plain sight, all the while refusing to explain their vagueness, the ostracizing of some who are disliked, for reasons uncertain and unbothered.
all these measured and intentional manoeuvrings just to be seen, to be heard, to appear to be "in the know".
oh yes, but to everyone else, we've seen, we've heard, and we know.