Rethinking Belonging II

There is nothing inherently wrong with peer groups or cliques. They are common to every middle and high school, typically based on friendships and mutual interests. However, they do have the potential to twist and mold an adolescent into their own image. The coming-of-age movie The Breakfast Club (1985) illustrates this state of affairs in an entertaining yet poignant way. The entire movie takes place in a Saturday detention hall in a suburban Chicago high school. Represented is one member of each social group in the school.

As each student strolls into the detention hall, the air is thick with posturing and posing. The camera pans over the five students, and you can see that each bears the emblems of their social group—buttons, sport shirts, jeans jackets, eye makeup, pocket protectors. Slowly, they are pushed by one another out of their comfort zones and forced to be real about who they really are on the inside. If you can look past the strong language, this film provides a great study on the concept of the formation of identity. Think about this for a moment. You were probably a member of at least one clique during your school years. What often acts as the glue or the bond that keeps these peer groups together? It is fear, plain and simple—the fear of being left out, of being different, of being nobody.

Rethinking the Quest

Telemachus bore a heavy burden. His father was rumored to have been lost at sea following the war at Troy, and men from his own town had invaded his home, demanding the hand of his lonely mother in marriage. This young man was the son of a king—and not just any king, mind you, but the legendary Odysseus. Despite being raised as royalty, daily being hailed as “Prince Telemachus,” this young man felt powerless in the face of the older suitors who had aggressively pushed their way into his home.

Telemachus had never really known Odysseus as a father, because he had left for Troy on the day of Telemachus’s birth. Intellectually, Telemachus understood that he was the son of a king, but his heart had questions. If Homer would have allowed us to look deeper into the soul of Telemachus, what questions we would find lurking there? “What kind of man was my father?” “Am I like him?” “He was a powerful man. Am I?” Are any of your students asking questions like these? The boy searched for answers to these questions by journeying to the city of Sparta to seek out the counsel of Menelaus, a mighty king who had fought alongside Odysseus at Troy.

Rethinking Belonging

As do we all, the students we work with possess a strong urge to belong. When they enter middle school, many adolescents feel lost almost isolated from all that is familiar. For good or ill, most will desperately seek out peer groups from which they can derive a sense of identity. Homer describes such a longing to discover one’s true identity in the person of Odysseus’s son, Telemachus.

Telemachus bore a heavy burden. His father was rumored to have been lost at sea following the war at Troy, and men from his own town had invaded his home, demanding the hand of his lonely mother in marriage. This young man was the son of a king—and not just any king, mind you, but the legendary Odysseus. Despite being raised as royalty, daily being hailed as “Prince Telemachus,” this young man felt powerless in the face of the older suitors who had aggressively pushed their way into his home. He desperately needed to know where he belonged.

Rethinking One's Place in the World

You can never really study people, you can only get to know them.
C. S. Lewis

History is the witness that testifies to the passing of time; it illumines reality, vitalizes memory, provides guidance in daily life and brings us tidings of antiquity.
Cicero

The young people that we work with crave a sense of belonging to something bigger than themselves. Politicians, too, have discovered this longing within their young constituents. In a speech delivered during the 2000 presidential election season, Senator John McCain of Arizona urged young people to remember the sacrifices of the past:

They fought for love, for love of an idea—that America stood for something greater than the sum of our individual interests. . . . Cynicism is suffocating the idealism of many Americans, especially among our young. . . . When we quit seeing ourselves as part of something greater than our self-interest then civic love gives way to the temptations of selfishness, bigotry and hate . . .

This call connected with many young voters, and even those who could not yet vote, and energized the campaign. These young people desperately wanted to be a part of something in which they could believe.