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  Take one look at yourself (you can double take if you have to) what do you see? I will tell you what I see, I see a person. no an animal disguised as a person. Why though? Why do I see an animal disguised as a person? Great question. raise your hand and keep it raised. Ok now put your hand down if you’re of the age of about fourteen to let’s say twenty. Ok now put your hand down if you don’t get paid minimum wage (that can be either higher or lower.) ok now put your hand down if This is called the cycle of Socialization, the act of being social towards a person. this cycle,  And this cycle is pathetic, stupid, and needs to DIE a gruesome, slow, painful death. Ok ok maybe I was being a bit too harsh but it still needs to DIE. I have seen this so called cycle in effect for a while now but I was oblivious. Also before we continue I just want to say I am attacking the WAY socialize each other and not society itself. But now I see the problem and I know how to stop it.this process takes a lot of time, care, and effort and  I’m about to suggest a lot of solutions to the problem but first I should talk about my personal experiences, ways I have both directly and indirectly influenced myself and others and everything I have noticed about myself. Trust me I have noticed a whole bunch of things about myself and how I have been socialized. And how I have been socialized. the cycle of socialization is split into four parts the beginning, middle, the results, and what we can do to break the cycle. And as I have stated before I hate this cycle because of how much of a constant reminder of your social status it is. Once again I am not placing blame on anyone here I am just sharing my thoughts, feelings, and suggestions. The judgement and I have been told how weak and worthless I was and how arrogant people thought I was (yes my ego can get the best of me sometimes). But I have NEVER BY ANY CIRCUMSTANCES LET MY ARROGANCE BOTHER ME. and some of my friends would agree I can be a little arrogant at times or even ignorant but this has never bothered me I just accepted that that was who I was and didn’t think much else of it and my parents call me a smart alec because (well I am one).  I didn’t bat an eye at all, But why? Well I think I have an answer to that Question, First up age how is this important? then media, then people who have influenced you.  

 

  Socialization is important I get it but the way we are doing it is WRONG. We NEED to reframe our understanding of society. and I don’t mean reframe our view to the point where we start worshiping big macs or whatever. But we need to reframe it enough we can make a change and peace. Life can be better IF WE COMMIT. None of this will work unless we commit. We can change the world if we commit. As michael jackson once said “if you wanna make the world a better place, take a look at yourself and make a change”, start with that man/woman in the mirror and change yourself. It’s a start. Not an impressive start but it is a start. This cycle of constant judgement and being given roles without consent or the fact that we often dehumanize or judge people of the opposite gender or different social class or race is wrong and should not be the thing that defines you. The thing that should define you is: well, you. As a fourteen year old male I feel obligated to fall into this cycle and I am TIRED OF WHINING ABOUT IT but that is what once again what I feel obligated to do (fine by me I still have a lot to whine about). Remember when I said age WAS KEY to socialization. Well I know some of you do and that is great but if you don’t then well I once again feel obligated to explain age DEFINES YOUR VERY EXISTENCE. What you wear, what/when you drive (ok maybe not what you drive but definitely when you drive), what grade you are in, what interests you, the list goes on and on and on and on zzzz. Ok I am going to move on before I put both you and myself to sleep (that’s if you are not asleep already). What I am saying is age is like the dictator in a dictatorship. I still can’t help but roll my eyes. I am a teen living in MODERN SOCIETY I DO NOT KNOW WHAT SOCIETY WAS LIKE 20 YEARS AGO. But I know one thing.

Anything in human life strives on improvement. Apple, Microsoft, Google. All were founded on improvement (for the most part at least). My point is us as a human race is always looking for ways to improve (and that is a good thing). If we just stuck to the basic fire the cave people gave us 1000 years ago then life would be a lot harder but we strive to improve so we made torches which were a lot easier to carry than a normal fire. Then there were batteries and flashlights.

 

  Now to address the elephant in the room (well pocket really),  your smart phone. Ok now raise your hand again and keep it raised. Ok good now put your hand down if you are or have used a smartphone in the past let's say 5-10 minutes good now put your hand down if you are using “social” media so snapchat, twitter, instagram, facebook, myspace, and yes even youtube. Ok now put your hand down if you have less than let’s say 20 followers/subscribers or whatever. Ok good “social” media is THE NUMBER ONE SOURCE OF SOCIALIZATION. Why? Because any shmo can go on to any one of these “social” media sites and make an account and post things. Yes I in fact have a youtube channel And that means I can go on other people’s accounts and express my opinion on the subject matter. But I have noticed that what I watch on youtube also impacts me as a person and alters my social perceptions. I’m a tech/ music guy so I go on youtube and I watch videos on tech/music and such, buuut I also love video games so I watch videos on video game related things. My point is what you watch, read, write about, listen to, and your personal interests and “social” media platforms such as facebook and youtube help influence you and make you you. This constant circle of media, friends, family,and social interaction are key to how this cycle (take a shot for every time I have said cycle in this essay). Works and thrives. And speaking of youtube, I can go on record and say I have subscribed to over ninety nine channels and most of them are  either tech or gaming channels. And why do I bring this up? Because I have been socialized to like what I like and if I like a channel I will subscribe to it. And if I don’t like the channel but I like a particular video then I hit the like button so at least I know I’m helping this person who worked very hard on out by showing that I at least like the person’s video. And this very act of liking a video is a choice I’ve made through years of social interactions with other human beings. And I also play the video games I play because it was either recommended to me, the trailer depicting the game is really cool and I want to play the game or my parents played them and I play both what they played and the new installments that particular game’s series has to offer. And if I like a particular series of videos on youtube I will watch the entire series through. All because of socialization and now I have been trying to be more strong in my demeanor. While I am still a master at the art of sarcasm, I try to dial it back and look at a situation logically (as I tend to do a lot). And go at it the most logical and efficient way possible. My methods may not make sense but they make sense to one person and one person only: ME..

 

  I am going to tell a story and if you get mad at words like gay then don’t read the next part. So it was seventh grade and at that time I had no idea about socialization at the time but from a sociological point of view this story makes perfect sense I was eating lunch when my social help person or whatever you want to call it came over to my table and told me I wasn’t alone in my social group thing. When I first met my now best friend Nicolai I thought I would see him this one single time and that was it but no we talked and I discovered he likes video games like I do and he liked sonic (the hedgehog not the drive in). And at this point I was on my sonic break, I mean I still played sonic games occasionally coming back to the series but I wasn’t as into it but this changed (you could call me a fanboy if you like). Nicolai got me back into a series that I once loved and if it wasn’t for him I wouldn’t love the blue hedgehog to the degree I do today. Why do I bring this up well because his love for sonic influenced me to get back into sonic and I wouldn’t be writing comics or drawing fanart if he hadn’t entered the picture. But maybe I am too much of a fanboy because my newly refound obsession didn’t go down well with other people. I was starting to be called gay by people and people even said nicolai were like dating or some weird thing like that and at the time I really didn’t like it but I don’t let it bother me as much anymore. I used to scream as loud as possible in anger and I occasionally still do but not to the degree I did before in fact and I hate to admit this but I have physically assaulted my friends out of anger and that brings me to another important part of my social life.

 

 I hit nicolai clear across the face at school, a teacher saw it and walked me to the office where I was issued an in school suspension. After I served my ISS period I went to apologize and make things right. Well we did sort of make up but the next day he pretended I didn’t even exist, when I went to the bathroom and I had to use the seventh grade bathroom and then after that I told him this: “if we don’t properly make up and move on I’m going to commit suicide.” Yes I was so heartbroken I was going to kill myself, and lo and behold it actually worked we went back to being friends. I am also going to tell you how nicolai’s maybe state of mental insanity now when he is around me he is perfectly cool no lashing out or anything. Now I’ve never actually seen him lash out personally but other people have.

 

  I will do my best to explain the day was April 22 2017 one day before my birthday which nicolai has yet to actually attend he was at mesa verde national park (I wasn’t there and I am gonna use strong language so keep that in mind). Now from what my friend Dillon has told me and what I have been able to piece together from nicolai himself the story goes a little tiny something like this: upon reaching mesa verde nicolai started acting weird. Very weird he was dropping the f bomb and saying other things, he was dropping rocks down the kievas (yes I know what they are called now), in the cliff dwellings while people were in them and next thing you know he is in the hospital and then in a mental institution in grand junction. The next day which was my birthday I was devastated to hear that he was in grand junction the following day I asked Dillon what happened and he told me roughly the same story I just told but it gets even weirder. Upon his return I asked him why he went coocoo for cocoa puffs and same story (this was after our fight by the way) but then he told me he was sexually assaulted by a girl and he enjoyed it. Now normally if some stranger came up and started rapeing you you would want that to stop right away but he let it continue for TWO DAYS . and I was wondering why then it hit me, he is mentally unstable and when you are mentally unstable you can’t think straight so he was probably drugged up on anti-depression meds (which I am 99.9 % sure is just pure sugar), and he could not process what was happening so he just let it happen. And this changed my social life because I had just got over our recent fight and I wanted to hang out with him on my birthday.  The cycle (yes I am going to stop cringing now). Has influenced me through all of these interactions between me and my friends/maybe enemies and myself. But this is bad because of the judging  and getting teased and laughed at and I was really annoyed (YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE). I even get annoyed at my friends sometimes and I get mad at my family members too.

 

   ok now that I have shared a lot of personal experiences I can really get into the nitty gritty of the whole social cycle. First we all need to break the cycle not just one, two, or three people. We can’t be afraid to at least try and it is this pathetic cowardly behavior towards change needs to stop. Did we all freak out when the iphone 7 dropped the headphone jack? Of course we did. Did we freak out when microsoft opted to make windows 8 more touch friendly? YES, do you get my point? Ok good, we need to stop freaking out every time bill gates blows his nose. The cycle needs to be abolished. It is ridiculous, stupid, and wrong. Parents aren’t doing their job and they are raising them similar or exactly the same, who cares if you are male, female, gay, lesbian, young, old, able bodied, or disabled you can make a

Difference. Imagine society as a candle, you are the wick and the cycle of socialization is the fire burning the wick. You are getting burned alive by the cycle and smoke is harmful to you and the environment and guess what creates smoke? If you guessed fire you would be correct, so the cycle of socialization is harmful to both you and society.

 

  the civil rights movement succeeded because the black people wanted to be treated the same as everybody else and they didn’t sit there twiddling their thumbs, they ROSE UP and took a stand against what wasn’t right and if you look around you can see their success, there is no longer segregation, discrimination, and judgment. And we can do the same to liberate society. I believe this is possible, we sent men to the moon multiple times, breaking a meaningless, stupid cycle should be easy. We do not need to go to war or pull guns out we just need to change our social outlook and understanding, we need to first take off that mask. The mask society bestowed upon you without your permission or consent.  

 

  I didn’t make a mask for a reason. My not making a mask represents my contribution to breaking the cycle, and I suggest you do the same, take off your mask and bust it into a billion little tiny pieces. DAMAGE IT BEYOND REPAIR. I don’t care how you do it just destroy it. Before I get even more what we today call triggered (driven to the point of insanity). I want to suggest a few things. Number one: stop looking at teens like myself as overly sensitive, drug addicted, bad habit driven slobs and see us as the catalyst for change. Number two: take a step back and look at yourself. I have and until recently I wasn’t proud of the “person” I saw and I suggest you do the same. Look at yourself. And make changes to yourself don’t fit in. I don’t feel like a social outcast but I also don’t feel like I fit in either and that is a good thing, be YOU not someone you are not. And number three: express yourself as you see yourself not how society sees you. Make a change, break the cycle. Take off your mask. Make a change. Make society a better place.