T w e n t y S i d e d

Has the meaning of “poser” migrated? My memory of it was that it meant “faker” or “impostor”. But here Max walks up to the skater guy and strikes up a conversation. She makes no effort to pretend she knows anything about skateboarding, but he calls her a poser anyway. (Technically she’s a poser AFTER she rewinds time and uses some fresh lingo to bluff her way through the conversation.) He seems to be using the word to mean “lame”. I dunno. It’s been a quarter century since I heard “poser” used as a derogatory term, and I can imagine usage has changed.

Also, I brought up the game Bully in this episode. Eleven years ago, Rockstar took a break from making open world games about car theft and murder to make this small, focused little game about one boy at a private school. I remember really enjoying it. I liked the non-lethal combat that ended fights by stuffing foes in lockers or garbage cans. I liked how each student character model had a specific name and identity, as opposed to filling out the school grounds with generic nameless clones. I loved the school itself. It wasn’t perfect or anything, but I’m sad the game seems to have been forgotten. It felt like a solid prototype for a much better game. Too bad Rockstar doesn’t seem inclined to revisit the idea.

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

To repeat my rant: If you’re a teacher and you make kids stay in your class when they say they’re sick, then you’re an asshole. A villain. Kids are human beings. They have pain and discomfort just like us big people. They also have a lot less coping mechanisms for dealing with discomfort. One stupid class session is not more important than their suffering. Making a kid stay when they ask to be excused is a great way to end up with blood, feces, urine, or vomit in your classroom, which isn’t going to improve anyone’s educational experience. Also, on top of making a kid suffer you’ve also given them an intensely humiliating experience that they will carry around for the rest of their lives.

Moreover, if a kid is trying to get out of class then they have already mentally checked out. You can make them stay, but you can’t make them learn. Refusing to let a kid use the bathroom is all downside. You monster.

Part of my problem was that I was really incompetent socially. There’s a certain performance of body language that we expect from people who are sick. It’s reflected in face, posture, and tone of voice. I don’t know if it’s something we learn from adults or if it just comes naturally for most people, but I apparently never got the memo and didn’t know how to “act” sick, even when I was sick. I’d just walk to the front of the room and state my problem, which would get me flagged as a faker. So once in a while I’d have one of those teachers that decided their dumb bullshit needed to be the center of my life and would send me back to my seat when I asked to be excused.

Well, that’s been bugging me for 35 years. Glad to finally get that off my chest. I feel like we’ve made some good progress here today.

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.