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 If they had been at the top

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Lizpuff

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PostSubject: If they had been at the top   If they had been at the top Icon_minitimeFri Aug 19, 2016 11:22 am

I have been spending some time reading over the older threads here because I like to read the opinions of those that do not frequent here anymore.

In any case one of the topics briefly discussed was: What would have happened if Eric and Dylan had been at the top of the social ladder?

What if they were both muscular good looking guys who played sports and hung out with jocks getting all the girls? What if they were religious and hung around in that crowd? What if they were anything but the so called bottom that they felt they were at?

Do you think they would have turned into "Rockys" bullying those that they saw as below them?
Do you think they would have been "nice" jocks and turned the population of Columbine around?
Or do you think that they would have turned out the same way that they were in reality and committed the crime anyway because no matter how life treated them they were inherently bad?
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aquillina




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PostSubject: Re: If they had been at the top   If they had been at the top Icon_minitimeFri Aug 19, 2016 2:53 pm

To be completely honest, I can't picture Sue and Tom spoiling Dylan like that. They could have if they wanted to. Sue seems too modest to raise Dylan to become like Rocky but this is probably all because of after the shooting. If Dylan had made into the baseball team and played throughout high school he probably would have become like any kid in high school. But as far as his depression and the constant bullying goes at Columbine, that would all have to come down to how he felt about and it wasn't good.

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shades

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PostSubject: Re: If they had been at the top   If they had been at the top Icon_minitimeFri Aug 19, 2016 3:23 pm

Lizpuff wrote:
Or do you think that they would have turned out the same way that they were in reality and committed the crime anyway because no matter how life treated them they were inherently bad

I think it is just this. See, for Dylan, the only way I can think of him is the way that he was. Dylan came with his own aesthetic, he was absolutely original from the way he looked, his style, his interests, and the way he was the tall, mellow laidback dude everybody knew and was attracted to. So I can't fathom how that wasn't popular enough. Today the way Dylan was would be absolutely obsessed over. As for Eric, I think if he bulked himself up much more he might've been more attractive and popular? He absolutely wouldn't be a jock, he would have to popular for another reason.

They wouldn't be like Rocky, but I also don't think they would be the source of changing the Columbine population. Dylan might have, but I don't see Eric being anything significant because he didn't really come with his own sense of identity. I like Eric of the two, but I knew that he didn't have his own sense of style. He would've just been a much more jock-like geek or something.

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aquillina




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PostSubject: Re: If they had been at the top   If they had been at the top Icon_minitimeFri Aug 19, 2016 3:34 pm

I also think the Harris' could have spoiled Eric. Yet I totally cannot picture Eric possessing any athleticism because of his size.
Neither Eric or Dylan would have been super star popular but they would be popular in some way in their own inner circle of friends, clique or whatever. Despite all that I still feel they can't escape the bullying.

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aquillina




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PostSubject: Re: If they had been at the top   If they had been at the top Icon_minitimeFri Aug 19, 2016 3:42 pm

ultraviolencelv wrote:
As for Eric, I think if he bulked himself up much more he might've been more attractive and popular? He absolutely wouldn't be a jock, he would have to popular for another reason.
To be completely honest, I like Eric the way he was/is. There I said it.

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Lizpuff

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PostSubject: Re: If they had been at the top   If they had been at the top Icon_minitimeFri Aug 19, 2016 3:45 pm

I am wondering about nature vs nuture. If the boys had been accepted and loved by so many of their peers would they still have been angry?

I guess I don't think either was born bad. I think that they got conditioned that way thru multiple factors.

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shades

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PostSubject: Re: If they had been at the top   If they had been at the top Icon_minitimeFri Aug 19, 2016 3:48 pm

Lizpuff wrote:
I am wondering about nature vs nuture. If the boys had been accepted and loved by so many of their peers would they still have been angry?

I guess I don't think either was born bad. I think that they got conditioned that way thru multiple factors.
I agree with you. I wouldn't say they were born bad.

As simple as it sounds, cause usually Columbine is a grey area, I do think if the boys had been accepted by their peers they wouldn't be so angry. But I feel it's more applicable to Eric than Dylan cause Dylan always seemed to have a void?

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Lizpuff

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PostSubject: Re: If they had been at the top   If they had been at the top Icon_minitimeFri Aug 19, 2016 3:56 pm

ultraviolencelv wrote:
Lizpuff wrote:
I am wondering about nature vs nuture. If the boys had been accepted and loved by so many of their peers would they still have been angry?

I guess I don't think either was born bad. I think that they got conditioned that way thru multiple factors.
I agree with you. I wouldn't say they were born bad.

As simple as it sounds, cause usually Columbine is a grey area, I do think if the boys had been accepted by their peers they wouldn't be so angry. But I feel it's more applicable to Eric than Dylan cause Dylan always seemed to have a void?

I agree. I tend to think that if Eric had just been accepted by both the guys and girls at school he could have kept his anger at bay. I am really not sure what would have helped Dylan. Easy answer is love but I really don't think that would have done it for him at all
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aquillina




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PostSubject: Re: If they had been at the top   If they had been at the top Icon_minitimeFri Aug 19, 2016 4:25 pm

My only concern is the bullying. Even Eric did get accepted by his peers he will still have to put up with those who don't. That's the reality of it, you can't be friends with everyone in the world and there will always be a-holes.

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Lizpuff

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PostSubject: Re: If they had been at the top   If they had been at the top Icon_minitimeFri Aug 19, 2016 4:48 pm

aquillina wrote:
My only concern is the bullying. Even Eric did get accepted by his peers he will still have to put up with those who don't. That's the reality of it, you can't be friends with everyone in the world and there will always be a-holes.

I mean you could say hypothetically what would happen if they were never bullied. But this whole conversation is all hypothetical of course!
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shades

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PostSubject: Re: If they had been at the top   If they had been at the top Icon_minitimeFri Aug 19, 2016 4:55 pm

aquillina wrote:
My only concern is the bullying. Even Eric did get accepted by his peers he will still have to put up with those who don't. That's the reality of it, you can't be friends with everyone in the world and there will always be a-holes.
You have a point. See, what makes Eric and Dylan different, harmful, even though others around them at the time couldn't see it was that they had no tolerance with bullying. See, others have taken much worse pickings in school than the boys did and they managed to suck it up and make it out of high school and venture to a free adult life. It's even possible that the bullying wasn't so severe and it was just in Eric and Dylan's minds that it's much worse than it was because they were insecure.

So as long as they got one tiny bit of hostile treatment, the boys took it like it was the end of the world which resulted to causing extreme harm.

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PostSubject: Re: If they had been at the top   If they had been at the top Icon_minitimeFri Aug 19, 2016 4:56 pm

If the boys were at the top, overall I think Dylan could've possibly taken the cake. Eric I don't see so much.

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PostSubject: Re: If they had been at the top   If they had been at the top Icon_minitimeSat Aug 20, 2016 8:38 am

Hmmmmmm. I have been thinking about this so much.
Maybe in another environment they would have had the possibility to be popular, to gain the respect they needed so bad - and so they would not have had any chances to accumulate enough anger to go NBK.
I assume it would have needed different environments for both of them.
While Eric could have earned respect in an environment where creative and weird nerds - who never get tired of seeking different solutions - are accepted and rewarded (and it is okay to act out sometimes), Dylan could have bloomed in another environment where "being different" and "being artistic" is the norm.
But Columbine was equally bad for them each.
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shades

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PostSubject: Re: If they had been at the top   If they had been at the top Icon_minitimeSat Aug 20, 2016 8:48 am

Then if we had to settle of the root cause of Columbine, isn't it leaning closer to environment than themselves?

I remember making the argument that they were wired differently, that they were always doomed - Dylan depressed, Eric with anger issues + altered by medications. After awhile I am seeing that for Eric he could have been saved.

So I am back to a grey area again. I have no idea what to settle with except to clump it all together.

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PostSubject: Re: If they had been at the top   If they had been at the top Icon_minitimeSun Aug 21, 2016 1:36 am

aquillina wrote:
ultraviolencelv wrote:
As for Eric, I think if he bulked himself up much more he might've been more attractive and popular? He absolutely wouldn't be a jock, he would have to popular for another reason.
To be completely honest, I like Eric the way he was/is. There I said it.


Me too.Of course I hate what he ended up doing but if I didn't see the likable things in him,things beyond what he did,I doubt I would have been a Columbiner for so long.

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Last edited by PaintItBlack on Mon Aug 22, 2016 3:00 am; edited 1 time in total
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shades

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PostSubject: Re: If they had been at the top   If they had been at the top Icon_minitimeSun Aug 21, 2016 3:28 am

I didn't mean I never liked Eric the way he was. I meant that should he had been popular it was probably due to physical changes that might get him recognised more. It probably wouldn't even be him that had to change it was probably the school and the people in it. If he himself wished he were bigger and taller then who cares if we like him for who he was? He never appreciated that of himself.

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