Our superficial society

Let me begin with a short anecdote:

I was in a hotel room with friends, on the last day of what had been, until then, an amazing holiday. Much like this journal, the topic of conversation quickly turned to girls and relationships.
We somehow began talking about bases, and to which one each of us had gotten. For those who have yet to come across the term, it's a baseball analogy where 'first base' is kissing, followed by progressively more intimate actions, and there are no prizes for guessing what 'a home run' signifies. I announced, with neither pride nor shame, that I have yet to reach first base at the ripe age of 17; this was received with a mixture of shock and pity, which baffles me. One then went on to say that he should set me up with one of his female friends, which I outright dismissed.

The story gets mildly more interesting here. Fast forward a few hours: after having visited the bar, we return to the hotel room, with one of my friends managing to get himself incredibly drunk on vodka. I, meanwhile, had merely sipped the wine which I had been pressured into buying earlier, and my other two friends remained relatively sober too. It all began rather humorously, with the drunk one rolling around giggling; I had my pen and notepad to hand, writing down quotes which I was sure he would forget by morning, in the hopes of generating conversations for the following day's travel.

Things soon took a turn for the worse. After getting bored of stuffing his face with fast food, he began to spew a stream of insults aimed at my physical appearance, but soon stopped when he saw that it was having no effect (or at least, that I was giving him that impression). Then, however, he switched the target of his verbal abuse to a certain girl I know (one who has appeared in these journals before, and one for whom my feelings are now somewhat subdued). Bearing in mind that he's never even met her, these comments really got to me somehow, and naturally I disagreed with all of them. Obviously I didn't write anything down, wanting nothing more than to forget it all, but frankly some of the words have been seared into my memory more permanently than they would've been in ink. This was followed by a sudden tribal urge to retaliate physically, to hurt him as much as he'd hurt me, and to defend the girl regardless of my feelings for her. I'm not a violent person, and this was something I'd never experienced before. I did nothing, of course; clearly it was the alcohol talking, and any reaction from me would have damaged our (sober) friendship.

I ended up in tears that night, for the injustice of it all. Perhaps it was the wine.

--

Now, I should start by saying that I strongly dislike the base system. Firstly, it attempts to quantify what really shouldn't be quantified, and secondly, it removes all emotion from the relationship itself – and what is a relationship without any emotion? Is it really worth inventing milestones for our sexual lives and not even caring about the person on the other end? Yes, perhaps 17 might be too early for delicate words like passion and love, but I feel that they've lost the priority that they used to hold. It seems that a lot of people these days are getting girlfriends for the sake of getting girlfriends. It's for this reason that I dislike the notion of setting people up; I'm not concerned about my own chances of meeting someone I can love, so the idea of someone else doing it for me doesn't appeal to me at all.

This brings to mind a second irk of mine that isn't directly related to this hotel room tale. If the topic of previous relationships ever arises, I generally respond with 'depends what you count as a relationship'. It's irritating, seeing how many people regard long-distance relationships as 'not proper'; I myself have had one that I truly enjoyed, and I have long stopped caring about how other people see it. What I hated most was how my peers seemed obsessed with whether or not I'd seen her naked. The answer is no, and I am in no way disappointed by that – what is important, however, is that I would proudly say that I loved her as much as any decent boyfriend would, and that a simple internet barrier would not stop me. In our messed-up society, even falling in love with someone doesn't count as a relationship, apparently. I've found that, interestingly, the few friends of mine who have been in stable relationships are the only ones who would freely use the word 'love', something which is casually avoided by many. I hold a great deal of respect for them; if anything, they give me hope.

It is that final part of the story that really irritates me. Before I continue, however, you must understand that I do not blame my then-drunken friend, nor can I fully forgive him; with that conclusion comes an entire rant about alcohol that I shan't write here. I am merely using him as an example of certain people in our society, and what happened in the hotel room was certainly not the only thing that spurred me to write this journal.

Again, it's the whole superficiality of the system, how appearances seem to override anything else. It's not just the media with its anorexic supermodels and its song lyrics about beauty; there are people around us who care about nothing more than how they look to everybody else, and it sickens me. In my opinion, a girl's appearance is but a bonus on top of things like her personality and interests, and the latter seem to have been neglected; I haven't seen much correlation between a girl's attractiveness and her personality, so why judge?

Of course, most people aren't like this, but they appear to have the most influence. I am disappointed.

--

Thanks for the comments, everyone. A special mention to Cave-Shinobi, who did this incredibly symbolic drawing as a result.