Just from everyday life, This Troper learned that good people are shit on, evil people win. The only way to succeed in life is to break the rules. The best part? Taking this to heart has helped me in many ways, including improving my grades and getting alot of entertainment.

Various Facebook pages that aren't for comedy have some pretty bad messages sent out. For instance, "You should never give up on something you can't go a day without thinking about". It's obviously meant to be something about romance but if applied to other things, it's because you can't stop thinking about something that is why you should give it up.

Various ones state that boyfriends should only show their affection in specific ways.

Bristol Palin, especially during the 2008 election: "If your handsome but somewhat thuglike boyfriend gets you with child, he will clean up nicely, propose marriage, and show up at an important family event wearing a suit and holding your hand. At which point you will get a standing ovation" (in the words of Gail Collins).

ThisTroper's jr. high english class was once reading fairy tales (some of the original Brother's Grimm types). One in particular was about a girl who was so stubborn and selfish that God himself stopped caring about her and let her get sick and die. At the funeral, after she had been buried, she tried to claw her way out of the grave, and her mother beat her hand with a stick when it popped out of the dirt. When the teacher asked the class to come up with a moral for the story, this troper's best friend said in a completely serious tone, "If you're stubborn enough, you can become immortal."

Hey, as Lewis Black said, "The good die young...but ''pricks'' live ''forever''!"

I had once said that the world would be a better place if certain types of people were killed. No, I'm not talking about ''race''.

Ditto; although a variation was that the world would be a better place if this troper's high school was blown up.

This troper wanted to write a story where the moral was "All humans are evil, so it's okay to commit mass murder", to see if anyone would be stupid enough to take it to heart. That and to piss off as many MoralGuardians as possible

OlderThanDirt: cf TheBible and The Great Flood. Exact same storyline. Plus, a FantasticRacism / KillEmAll subtext.

To be fair Noah did give everyone else a fair chance to enter the ark and escape the flood.

I dunno -- "If some schizophrenic old man started building a huge boat and saying the whole world would flood, I personally wouldn't believe him..."

Which is exactly what people did in the Bible when Noah tried to warn people...aaand they all died.

This troper, for a short story assignment and contest in grade 7, once tossed off this little thing about a phantom chess player. Dad forced him to rewrite it again and again, improving it until it was perfect (or as perfect as a ridiculous grade 7 fantasy story could be). In the end, this troper won the short story competition, and learned that if you work really hard and persevere, striving to continually improve your work until it's as good as it can be... you can wind up so bloody sick of the whole thing that you don't care how well you did, you just care that it's over. To this day this troper has issues with applying himself to pretty much anything he can't do perfectly right off the bat.

Wow! You learned, in grade 7, the Aesop that most people require writing a Masters or Doctoral Thesis to learn.

This troper used to be a semi-NaiveEverygirl until she moved to the Northern part of the U.S., where she experienced (and is ''still'' experiencing) what she deems as 'eternal torment' at the hands of some of her peers, not to mention she's bored shitless because NothingExcitingEverHappensHere. The moral of the story? KidsAreCruel, TeensAreMonsters, life is something that you can't--are not ''allowed''-- to enjoy if you're a 'nerd' (according to my peers), and most people in this troper's city are a bunch of assholes with no morals whatsoever.

Just let me know the co-ordinates, and I'll have a semi truck full of high explosives wipe the place from the face of the earth for you.

Family-unfriendly Aesop learned from this tale; if you complain loud enough, somebody WILL BLOW YOU THE HELL UP ENDING YOUR SUFFERING IN A PAINFUL WAY.

Here's a family friendly aesop for you. "If you don't like the town you live in, then MOVE!"

I had the exact same hing happen to me...only I moved to the "southern" U.S. I had never heard such hateful, racist, homophobic insults and threats until I moved to... NORTH CAROLINA! (dun dun duuun)...Yeah, i guess that isn't very "southern".

When This troper was very young (I can't remember the exact age or grade, it was either 5th or 6th Grade. A kid in my class threatend to kill me. I told the teacher and we went to the office. They said "oh he says stuff like that all the time" and just let him go, worst they scolded me for inturrupting the class, also I got in trouble for suggesting they do something "before" he tries to carry out something like that. Moral, people who threaten to to kill, maim, or harm others will go ignored untill they do something and then everyone will act surprised when they do. (I never knew if he went through on any of his plans as we moved away a few months later, but he continued to torment me and get away with it until then.)

This is actually the Aesop of {{Literature/ChronicleOfADeathForetold}} (original Spanish title: Crónica de una muerte anunciada) by {{Gabriel García Márquez}}.

This advice actually work, if people just ignore his threat and take it as joke the kid MUCH less likely to commit some funny business. He/she just what to get some attention and death threat is actually a very good way... Personal experience: This troper has been Threatening to kill everybody since grade 3th and I haven kill anyone...yet

Same troper from the one about the kid who threatend my life and got away with it. Ok this happend before that, I was a kid and at the time I was into dragons. I was talking to a teacher about how I would love to write a story with dragons in it, then I made a brief comment that some dragons breath fire and that if one of those dragons existed that it could burn down the school and that would be horrible.....and of course that means that I was threating to burn the school down, because I got suspended for that. Moral, it's wrong for a child to compare reality and fantasy because your teachers arn't really listening and only pickout whatever they need to get you out of the way. (I do understand that in some twisted way that could be taken as a vauge threat, but this is the same school with the crazy kid who tells people he's gonna kill them)

Actually the combined Aesop seems to be 'Only threaten those who have no power over you'. He threatened you, which was 'fine', you "threatened" the school and by extention the teachers/administration. It's really the perfect Aesop on how to be a bully.

No no, the moral is "Government employees, and by extension, Government School teachers are idiots"

Once again this troper remembers that he has been picked on a lot thought his school days for many reasons that the kids made up. I would tell the teachers of the constent torment and they would say things like "well I didn't see them doing it", "They are just jokeing around with you", "don't inturpt my class", ext. It got increasingly difficult at school, but that's not the worst part...the worst part is if I decided to retalate in anyway THEY WOULD TELL and this troper would get in trouble...this troper is the human version of this this trope.

Sounds a lot like a real life version of SelectiveEnforcement as well.

Huh. I could have sworn I never edited this page...

This troper's father once tried to make me like my horrible new bowl cut by saying this "Guys will want to be you, and girls will want to be you." As a teenager and troper, my response was as follows #QUOTE#"So this haircut encourages people to follow the trends set by another in order to be popular and it encourages girls to judge what's on the outside rather than the inside. Great lesson dad."

The lesson sounds to me like "Bowlcuts are the perfect haircut if you are an androgynous narcissist."

This troper was having trouble finding love and had never had a girlfriend. I was rather grumpy about it. I was assigned to be in a group in science class. I instantly declared myself dictator of the group, and acted in a ridiculously authoritative manner. UST started with one of the girls I was bossing around. We became boyfriend/girlfriend, and have been ever since. The moral? If you're absurdly cruel to a girl, she'll fall in love with you.

I learned that from ''Literature/{{Twilight}}''.

AllGirlsWantBadBoys

A more noticable moral is acting like a "silly nerd" is a good way to delay the time you eventually get a girlfriend (unless said girlfriend is a nerd too).

Back in fourth grade, this troper was teased by a few other girls for being a little chubby and struggling in gym. (The fact they struggled in gym too was besides the point.) When this troper went to talk to the school councilor about this, she was promptly advised about joining a weight loss program for kids. As a result, this troper quickly deduced that adults were useless and would just blame all her problems on her rather than addressing anyone else's bad behavior.

If you are teased as a child for being fat, you may be more likely to actually lose that weight to "fit in and be accepted". It's not a good thing to be bullied or to change yourself just to be accepted. But not being fat is very important and removes the "they are bullying me because i am fat" stigma that a lot of children get.

The above troper embodies family unfriendly aesop! "Being bullied is bad, unless it forces you to lose weight. In which case the bullies were completely justified"

This troper once saw a sign at school of several kids wearing the same thing saying "Dude, if they ever forced us to wear school uniforms we'd, like, totally lose our individuality!" Hence the moral is "If you're going to wear something that other people just so happen to like then you're a hypocrite. Give up your freedom of choice and wear something that you hate and look like everyone else."

ie "Conform until you bleed."

I am the mother/I'm older seems to be the only thing my mother can say whenever I disagree with her...

that's stupid, I'm seventeen and even I know that after a certain age people just don't take "because I said so" seriously. then you turn my age and start rebelling and they scream to their friends/significant other/anyone who will listen: "why are my children being so rebellious!?!?!?"

This troper's parents have always been a little too obsessed with her education. If they found out she had failed a test they bothered her about it for ''months''. So when this troper failed a couple of exams once, she lied about it and decided to retake those exams as soon as possible. The problem was it wasn't going to be possible for nearly a year and this troper had to tell a few more lies to keep the original one believable. Eventually she passed the exams and her parents never found out. Both this troper and her parents were a little bit happier thanks to those lies.

Related: This troper can't ever talk to his father about school because he expects perfection, and my mother basically micromanaged me throughout my entire school career, saying that if she didn't I would never learn to be responsible.

When I was about to go to high school, my parents said they were thinking about having me go to a private school away from my friends because they thought I could do better than a B average. They specifically said that they would only send me if they wanted to. I said I didn't want to. They sent me there anyway. They then said "We never said that" even though A) I can remember it like it was yesterday (and this was years ago) and B) they later admitted they did say this. So they said they would send me for one year and see how I like it. Not buying this for a second, I complained until they let me go to the local public school after one semester. Moral: parents are lying bastards who can't be trusted, and complaining will get you what you want.

I think that I (and quite possibly the majority of men in some form or fashion) have learned through trial and error is "in a relationship, try and deceive women as much as possible to avoid offending them."

Eventually you learn to lie by omission. Never mention her weight, or her annoying habits. To get away and do stuff you like rather than stuff she likes though, it's always necessary to lie. Girls don't react well when you say you want to leave them during their period to play CallOfDuty.

This troper, a few days after entering highschool, met a boy who was obviously unpopular and generally ill-treated by the rest of the class. She treated him politely during their first few interactions, and in return, he ''stalked and harassed'' her for the next two years, until she managed to change schools. Moral of the story: "Don't be nice to that freaky loner, the other kids are avoiding him for a reason."

This troper had to deal with someone like that before as well. Just a simple gesture of kindness towards this guy, and suddenly I could never get him away from me. Eventually, he started leaving me alone when I started ignoring him completely (His annoyance level went '''OVER NINE THOUSAND''' before he finally took the hint and left me alone).

Are you sure you're not me? It was junior high for me, and I tried to be decent about it and just ignore him until he followed me home one day. My reaction? I grabbed our firewood hatchet and chased him down the street with it, and told him if I ever caught him near my house again, I'd scalp him. Fortunately he believed me, and that was the end of ''that'' one. Moral of the story: when subtlety and reasonableness fail, go for the axe.

This troper would like to sympathize with the "weirdos" and say that when you're an ostracized loner because humans are bastards and having undesirable circumstances out of your control, that having someone show you the smallest hint of rare kindness can make your day. Imagine this: you're going through life hated, shunned, and alone when someone FINALLY talks to you, shows interest. You don't realize that you're weirding them out, you just want a friend. Now imagine that you're trying to just get someone to like you and they do what everyone else does and, bar it all, chase you away with an axe. Scarring and confusing you. I hope you sleep well at night. The moral? "It's ok to judge a book by its cover because everyone has the same life you do" Great Aesop, I applaud you all /sarcasm

This trooper, far from simply learning lessons from things in his life that happen, seeks to apply it to everything he sees. This leads to severe headbanging from this trooper's girlfriend, friends, and family when applied to tv. Common lessons are, if you're ugly no one will love you, killing random people will get you women and wealth, if you're hot you can't get aids, and black people can only stand up for themselves with the aid of a white guy.

This troper has learned that it's not worth standing up to her mother's bullying if there's nothing she can get out of it [such as permission to go to Schoolies] because it will only make her mother worse. I've also learned multiple times that even when my mother's been better lately and appears to have done a bit of a HeelFaceTurn, I still shouldn't trust her with anything or put any faith in her, because her new attitude won't last, but the trust and faith will probably come back to bite me in the ass.

This troper was attending a 'Climate gathering' at his university. After a few hours of getting bored of the stock Green Aesops uttered, he stood up, and made a valid argument that humanity takes resources that he can't replace from the planet simply by not being part of any food chain, and extremely rapid reproduction. After comparing humans to rabbits in Australia, littarily saying that 'Humanity is a plague, and the only real way to save the planet would be by reducing the population.', he was given a Main/SlowClap for daring to announce an inconvenient truth.

But it IS true, there's no way humans can keep breeding like gerbils and NOT cause an ecosystem collapse and eventually the extinction of our own species, and anyway, how irresponsible do you have to be to procreate when their are kids starving in the streets?

They aren't. Most advanced nations are declining in population, and thus face another apocolypse, the age bomb, where the number of people working becomes less than the number of people in retirement, and the government runs out of money. Japan is already facing this. The lesson learned here is to have lots of babies or your pension funds will run out.

Awfully irresponsible to be using the internet and electricity while people are starving too, doncha know.

Not too surprising. Some of the more extremist in the green movement believe that humanity should be extinct if the earth is to survive.

My cousin comes close to this - he believes that in order to save resources, one-third of the human population must die.

It makes sense to me, although I've once claimed that killing off ninety percent of the Earth's population would work far better than killing say, one-third. After all, AMillionIsAStatistic, and UtopiaJustifiesTheMeans. Don't know if I really buy what I'm saying, though.

"...humanity takes resources that '''he''' can't replace"? I can't think of any way to make that neither misandristic or misogynistic, unless you mean that you ''personally'' can't replace those resources.

English is a language that uses masculine pronouns when the gender is unknown or mixed, it's the way the language works. It's no more misogynistic than the French noun for person being feminine is misandristic. Trying to change this always results in making things more complicated, and being completely stupid. (Person whole cover, bat-person, Resting your feet on an ottoperson) People need to be less uptight.

This troper used to have a bully problem back in middle school and whenever I went to tell the teachers I would somehow get in trouble. Due to being relatively small before puberty, only my close friends and family knew I was heavily into boxing. When said bully took things too far I proceeded to punch him out to the point where he lost two teeth plus several bruises. He never bothered me again and I did not get in trouble. The moral? Fix your own damn problems through all means instead of going through the way they tell you to do.

At the Christmas Assembly at ThisTroper's Catholic school, one of the bidding prayers was for "all married couples who long for children". So the moral is: Anyone who isn't married and wants to be a parent doesn't deserve spiritual support. Merry Christmas.

I think you are missing the point. Most unmarried couples dont want to have kids. And its pretty uncommon to find such a couple these days.

I frecuently heard (About homophobia) the next argument: "if you hate homosexuals/lesbians, it's because secretly, you are one of them, but you refuse to accept it". While I truly think there are some persons who are like that, I think the great majority of the people with troubles and deals against homosexuality are just people who hate them sincerily: no frustation, no repressed sexuality. The lesson here? The hate is an incredible pure emotion, maybe the PUREST human emotion.

Some people doesnt know that ThePowerOfHate also exists

ThisTroper's friends cut school to see the afternoon showing of the first LordOfTheRings movie the day it came out, and invited her to come with. I wanted to go, but I turned them down, thinking that my mother would be disappointed to hear that I did something so irresponsible as cutting class to go see a movie that I could just see the following weekend; they called me a goody-two-shoes and a nerd, and went without me. When I told this to my mom upon arriving home, she called me an idiot for not going to see the movie and was disappointed that her daughter was such a square. The lesson: "Even your mom will think you're a geek if you don't give into peer pressure once in awhile."

Is your Mom my Mom?

In elementary school I was the target for bullying. When I told my parents about this they said something like "well, you're obviously doing something to make them bully you". In other words: "well, it sounds like it's all your fault".

This troper loves writing stories, but often she would rethink some of these and question what she was thinking. Although one result of this was me thinking, "Omigosh, I killed her off because...because..." when a character's sexuality was just used as a way to work around a problem that was originally to be dealt with an untimely death, which was later written out.

This troper was in 4th grade, and our (ultra-cool) science teacher was teaching us things about police work and crime, which led up to us reading classic fairy tales and determining who was more guilty in these stories, the "hero" or the "villain."

This troper once had to do a presentation on high school about the world's currencies. After he's finished showing the various kinds of paper money and coins from around the world, he explains to the audience that most money feature national heroes. Then he, with the cheerfully sarcastic attitude he comments/snark on everything with, asks the audience whether they want to be national heroes for the sake of having their faces put on coins. The audience yelled yes, then a particularly annoying kid at the back of the class asked how do you become a national hero. This troper then said in monotone, "Kill Japanese people". Nobody objected. Then again, most people in this troper's high school had always been kind of wacky, so I don't really know whether they were serious or not.

This troper has vivid memories of being in elementary school and being told (by her parents, no less!) ''not to stick up for bullied kids, so that you won't get bullied yourself.'' The moral of this story? "If you see someone whose life is hell, be an InnocentBystander and pretend it isn't happening to save yourself."

ItGetsWorse. This troper ''was'' one of the bullied kids at the time, so she was basically told, ''by her parents'', that she was worthless and no one would help her. This taught her the wonderfully family friendly moral "Never trust anyone, since the only one you can depend on in times of trouble is yourself."

This page: Any unfortunate or unpleasant situation proves that life sucks.

This troper saw one in the form of watching a cousin of mine get away with cheating by using false pretenses and circumstances to prove his wife wrong. Moral of the story: You can get away with the most heinous of actions if one is able to convince others wrong or "reversing the rules" of the situation". {{Facepalm}}. Sad part is, this is quite true in {{Real Life}}. Ask some lawyers.

This troper got into a fight with her friend that started because she'd been not that great of a friend, and her friend, not knowing the reason behind this, had called her out on it, and she, explaining the reason and how it stemmed from something psychological and from hurt feelings she had gotten on the friends behalf, basically got a response of "If you're going to be a bitch because of stuff you feel I can't help you, but I didn't do anything wrong." This taught her that telling people your true feelings will do nothing but screw everything up more and that her friend was a bitch who couldn't accept blame. (which was true by the way, and this troper usually kept her mouth shut about it.)

This troper has one: I had just gotten out of the hospital after major abdominal surgery, and was on lots of painkillers and unable to drive. My mother offered to bring me along with her to visit some family friends, stating that we would be back before my next dose of painkillers was due. That time came and went, and she wouldn't leave, because she was having a good time with friends she hadn't seen in a long while. Forty-five minutes after my painkillers were due, she finally agreed to get up to leave - only to spend the next ten minutes standing in the doorway talking. Once out of the door and halfway to the car, she stopped and turned to start talking about another subject. When I took the horrible action of grabbing her arm and reminding her "I need to take my pain killers" she finally got in the car - and subjected me to a lecture the entire way home about how selfish and rude I was being. Sure I was in pain, but she had been in pain before. She was a talker, and should not be forced to "change who I am." Moral of the story: Your parents don't actually put your physical well-being over their own desires, and being upset when someone does not honor a commitment they made is a selfish attack on their very identity.

Just to say, this troper ''agrees'' with the Aesop from ''Snoopy Come Home'', as given on the main page...

This troper started cutting an art class in high school because he couldn't get stuff done. In college, he quit a vocal groups class in college because he was fed up with all the religious songs he was forced to sing. In both cases, his mother was fine with it. The moral of this story is, "if you don't like your class or job, just quit".

This Troper has been kicked out of college twice and now goes(rarely) to a shitty community college that depresses him to the point of drinking heavily. When he told his mother about this and his desire to move out, she told him that he would not be allowed to do the latter and if he complained about the CC one more time, she'd kick him out. For bonus points, she allowed him to buy an Xbox 360 with HIS OWN MONEY from a job that causes just and many problems emotionally as the school, then yelled at him, repeatedly, for buying the 360 and complaining about the job. Aesop? "Stop trying, you'll never be good enough."

That Aesop sounds more like "Your parents can't force you to succeed, but they can still be angry at you for failing"

Almost all through middle-school This Troper suffered bullies and general ostracising due to being completely socially inept, and that he responded to all insults,no matter how minor, with violence. Something he wasn't even all that good at. This resulted in people mocking him even more, as they found it hilarious to watch him flail ineffectually against people both stronger and more skilled than himself. This abruptly ended, when he, after having been called out on his speech-impediment one time to many, brutally assaulted the guy with a steel-toed boot in the showers after gym, and somehow got away scot-free. Aesop learned: When violence fails, you are simply not using enough.

This troper learns these on a regular basis. For example, "Even if you're the one who bought something, someone else can claim it as long as they're older than you."

That aesop is inverted with this troper. Instead, it's "Even if you're the one who bought something, you always have to share it with the little ones to be nice, even if they could break it."

ThisTroper has, several times in school, borne witness to entire classes being punished for one person's actions. The moral is "Don't bother behaving, because you'll get into trouble anyway."

That sort of punishment is extremely common in the military, but the moral there is "If any one of you doesn't behave, it can get all of you killed".

In this troper's Drivers Ed class, one of the girls told us a story about her grandfather: One day, while driving, his car stalled on the train tracks...just in time for an oncoming train to arrive. He didn't get out of the car in time, and the car was destroyed, but he miraculously survived. How? By not wearing his seatbelt. I can't quite remember the explanation for it, but it had something to do with him not staying put in the same place, and therefore not getting crushed by the train. Lesson: Sometimes, ''not'' wearing your seatbelt can save your life.

Not sure if this counts or not, but probably not something you would see on a kids' show: This troper just figured out what she can take away from that time a friend-of-a-friend betrayed me; "Trust should be earned, not given."

I've been working on a comic story lately, and soon realized that it unintentionally had a very unfriendly aesop. I don't wish to give too much away, but the story basically says "Not only is it okay to make fun of people for being different, but you should, because they're probably evil." I decided to just go with it. Should be interesting to see people's reactions.

This troper's whole life has been a string of family unfriendly aesops. I'll try to run through them in order- First, Kindergarten. In the first month, I made several friends. Then came Valentines day, which my teacher decided called for a special activity. So, everyone made valentines hearts for their best friends. Except, apparently, I was the ONLY student who hadn't been taught about 'this and that' in kindergarten, so I actually gave my best friend a valentine. This resulted in me getting beat up, losing all my friends, and having a rumor started which kept me from having any friends. Therefore, first aesop- Not understanding a situation is no excuse for doing something 'wrong'. An additional second aesop- Parents should teach their children about sex and romance when they're still children, or they'll make a faux pass and lose all their friends. Anyway, after that, I spent the rest of the year without any friends. After summer vacation, a few people had gotten over or forgotten the rumor, so I was able to make more friends, and actually had a close friend. Then, during the first game of 'Hide and Go Seek' we played, I was able to outsneak everyone else, which made that one close friend- Who, as it turns out, hated being outdone at anything- become an angry enemy. Which brings me to another Aesop- People only like you if you can't do anything better than them. The moment you show that you're more capable in any area, no matter how irrelevant, they'll go through a heel face turn and betray you. Then, after that fiasco, I went through the rest of the year and learned, slowly, about 'The Rules'... Which were literally the rules. As might be expected, with my first year or so of social development being somewhat stunted, I thought the rules should be absolute, and got very angry when the playground monitors ignored the people who broke them, so eventually I decided [after watching a lot of Batman] that I would make the other kids follow the rules. As it turns out, sneaking up on rule-breakers and beating the crap out of them is strongly frowned upon, even in the first grade... So, after a couple times, I was threatened with being sent to alternative school. Which brings me to another Aesop- People don't care why you're doing something, they just want you to stop and have no problem using disproportionate retribution. After a couple years of continuing there, my family was forced into a move. At the new school, everything was nice, until they got my records, after which word spread. A few of the kids decided that if I was a tough guy in my old school, then if they beat the crap out of me it would mean they were as tough as I was. Of course, because they didn't have a record, when the fight was discovered everyone assumed I was in the wrong. Yet another aesop- It doesn't matter what actually happened, people will believe whatever fits into the status quo best. I could keep going from there, but I think I'll just say that the aesops didn't really get any better from there on.

My parents are really hypocritical at times, they let me and my brother take responsibility for getting our own clothes. Yet they still throw away perfectly fine pieces of clothing because of such trivial things as small holes in areas that won't be seen. I got some of my t-shirts thrown out because of this, never mind that they were expensive and that I rarely wear only t-shirts outside except for the Summer. The aesop: No matter how much responsibility you get somebody is going to interfere and enforce their standards on you. There's also a second one, your parents will not knock, practice what they preach or care to ask before using your stuff. At least they haven't taken money from me yet.

This autistic troper has always had difficulty understanding the nuance of society, but this may in large part be because society on occasion likes to change the rules like a little bitch afraid of losing at poker. He remembers when he was a kid and defending a friend from two bullies at the cost of personal harm(a painful cut along his right ear and a kick to the solarplexus) and the next day 'he' got in trouble for doing this because the school is 'responsible for the student from the moment they get there till the moment they get home'. While the Aesop seems like it should be, violence is wrong, even when used to protect another...but what it came across as was, "Don't clean up the messes of officials, it leaves them with more egg on their face when not only are the victims parents complaining but when the bullies parents complain as well." or something that basically made this troper put little stock into the administrative staffers in schools.

My older sister is allowed to to whatever she wants, while my mom still doesn't want me to cross busy streets by myself. (I'm 17!) I asked her why she doesn't do anything about my sister (who drinks and steals from the family and treats us all, even the dog, like crap. One time while we were gone, she had a house party and about $500 worth of video game stuff got stolen, most of which was mine. Mom didn't make her pay...) and she said it was because she's such a handful that she gave up on her. Moral of the story? If I act like a crazy bitch long enough, my mom will finally let me do what I want!

I was bullied CONSTANTLY in middle school, every day and sometimes even in front of the teachers. It only got physical once, when my friend confronted one of the girls out of my earshot, and told her to stop picking on me. Girl smashes my friend's head against the locker. She's crying, teacher comes in and takes them both away. Girl comes back the very next day, no suspension, not even in-school suspension, and the first thing she does when she sees me? Starts talkin' smack to me again. In high school, there was only one guy, but he picked on me every day, we both sat in the front row of the classroom, right in front of the teacher's desk. She knew what he was doing, and definately turned a blind eye when I chewed him out. (she looked away as if pretending not to notice. XD She hated him too) He never really got in trouble, but from what it seems, I don't think the teacher was really able to do much. If the higher-ups at the school don't want to do anything, the teachers can't really do anything. Moral of the story? If someone in school is giving you problems, don't trust authority figures. They either can't or won't do anything. You always have to take matters into your own hands.

The following family unfriendly aesops I've learned:

Despite that KarmaHoudini has the NoRealLifeExamplesPlease, it is '''''very''''' TruthInTelevision.

The majority of people are borderline sociopaths who will gladly step over your corpse to get a better parking spot (or to get into a better place in life) yet if you screw up, will not hesitate to pass howling judgment.

If you are an AcceptableTarget in ''any'' way, nobody will give a shit what happens to you; in worst cases even ''applauding'' violence, inconvenience, pain, and shit inflicted on you, calling them an AntiHero.

AbuseIsOkayWhenItIsFemaleOnMale. It is also okay if it's inflicted by a younger person. Men are expected to be emotionless punching bags to women and younger people.

If you're nice to someone, the best you can expect in response is to be treated like trash.

the best way to be popular, especially on the internet, is to be as perpetually negative as the temperature around the South Pole. Don't ''ever'' look on the bright side of life; you'll just be called "Gay" and are very likely to be ignored.

Everybody wants equality, but they only want the good parts of it. They will immediately go back to strict inequalities and even go so far as to become a SocialDarwinist if it means they get away with it.

A few I've picked up:

Our teachers asked us this question every year: "Which would you rather be: beautiful and poor, or rich and ugly?" They even made us write an essay on it, like it was important. We were not allowed to say, "None of the above," or propose a different set of traits for the essay. I learned that beauty and money must be pretty important, maybe even more important than brains (I was only in elementary school; I didn't know any better).

If your bullies are shorter than you, you must be a wimp for feeling hurt. Also, bullying is "just what kids do" and you shouldn't take them seriously, even if they're punching you. You also shouldn't fight back. (an "adult" told me that, point blank)

It's totally okay for people to call you the n-word and abuse you if you're light-skinned, because that makes up for what your white ancestors did (I'm still wondering how the hell those kids came to that conclusion).

Thinking ahead, then acting accordingly is very, very bad. It makes teachers yell at you, even if you're wrong and your mistake can be easily remedied. (comes from years of experience in school)

The best way to motivate someone is to berate them or threaten them with a thick yardstick. Especially if they're first graders.

If a kid says that a grown-up did something that was not right, the kid is most likely lying, doesn't remember things properly (meaning their memory should always be questioned from that point on, making their credibility perpetually dubious), or did something to deserve that not-right treatment. (courtesy of some of my ''teachers'')

Abuse is okay, as long as the person turns out fine later in life, so the survivor has no right to complain about it. (courtesy of many people who weren't therapists)