A Look Into a Hierarchy
An entire student class is analyzed in SSH terms
There were 156 students in my high school graduating class, 80 young men and 76 young women.
MEN
9 top-tier men. 11 percent Alphas and one Sigma.
WOMEN
13 top-tier women. 17 percent Barbies.
If there is interest in this, I will take the time to go through the entire class of 156 and do my best to retroactively classify all of the men per the SSH and all the women according to the standard 1-10 scale.
It’s worth noting that the school was a private academy, but a religious one rather than a prep school, so the student body was from families that were wealthier than average, but for the most part, normal upper middle class. And, of course, being in Minnesota during the 1980s, the average looks were more attractive than one tended to find elsewhere.
Since I spent as much as six years there, between the ages of 11-17, I think I can reasonably well classify most of them. There are a few that will be challenging, but c’est la vie.
UPDATE: As I managed to locate some pictures that are publicly available on the Internet and colorize them, a little more context can be provided. Below is the Homecoming Court for my class, in which can be seen five of the aforementioned men and three of the aforementioned women.
Interestingly enough, the queen, while a very nice and popular girl whom I quite liked, is not one of those I considered to be in the top tier at the time. She was an athlete who observably cleaned up rather nicely that night. I should also point that none of the young men had mullets, those are just shadows left from the old black-and-white picture.
It’s a good idea. There’s the case study aspect that people find clarifying. Especially cases from the formative period when you were laying the perceptual foundations. And a lot of people like characters.
Writing from personal anecdote never feels comfortable, but I also prefer abstract, speculative reading. It’s been my limited experience that for many, recurring contexts and people actually make conceptual takes more appealing. Mass culture seems to be nearing peak fruit fly, so anything that helps a crucial idea that’s longer that a meme stick is a net plus.
And that photo. You guys look a bit more affluent, but holy time capsule…
I never encountered any girls named Heather until I was in an ROTC class in college (for the activities of rappelling and sky diving). There were two Heathers in the class, both were nines.