20. We want to move from the wide world into exploring our own cultures (school, municipal, religious, home) so write a blog post connecting Sullivan in any way you can to the themes from Rwanda or your other chosen conflict/incident. Some questions you may want to consider: How did the two (or more) groups become divided or chosen originally? How do groups get chosen at Sullivan? What outside influences increased/decreased the tension between the groups? Are there "outside influences" on social circles here at school? What sort of things do different groups value? What do they describe as the reason for disliking another group? How much of there opinion of "others" is based on fact or personal experience? How much is based on rumours, half truths, and propaganda? How do these messages spread through Sullivan? What stops students from learning more about others rather than believing what they hear or read?

Finish with some personal stories of times when you found yourself believing things about others AND times when others believed things about you.



Every school has groups and cliques, almost like the Rwandans... When I look back at the movie I realized that the Rwandans aka Hutu's and Tutsi's were seperated and divided due to the way they were treated by eachother and outsiders. The Tutsi's were the Belgins "favourite" because they had the same similarities as them... the Hutu's on the other hand were absolutely nothing, this infuriated the Hutu's. 


The same goes on in Sullivan Heights Secondary. In my opinion I feel that people have to live upto other peoples expectations... Their is always that one Leader of the group that will order the followers around. People in Sullivan choose their groups differently... the popular kids will always want popular kids... the smart people will always want the smart people... Jocks want sporty people. The outsiders have an influence on groups alot because if its popular kids are hanging out with popular kids and theirs that one kid that doesnt fit in, the popular kids will start judging and this is were bullying comes into play... Popular kids will pick and name call. If groups in Sullivan ever got into a fight I know for a fact outsiders would get involved and increase the issue.


 A personal story: It was in 2011 of Janurary, it was my 16th partybus we all had a blast and a few people that i didnt know were on the partybus, so what? they were friends of my friends... i thought it was okay... We all had a blast. After the partybus we all went to tim hortans... all of a sudden I realized that my phone was stolen... My bestfriend Amaan and Kristy and I went looking for my phone... Then I realized that the people I didnt know took it.. I was furious I marched my way up too them along with Amaan and asked for it back... As usual they denied... I lost it... so did Amaan, Amaan was defending me and as a friend he helped me... The random people that came too my party called a bunch of outsiders to fight their battles. It escladed... I left with Amaan and my bestfriend Ashley. A couple of days later at school the girls that I thought were my friends called the same random people that came to my partybus came too our school to fight... We were so unaware of the fact these randoms were at a school... Amaan and I were walking in the hallways all of a sudden these randoms came running towards us with a mace can and brass knuckles... We ran as fast as we can to the office and stayed their until they got caught, the girls that go to our school and that called these randoms got caught.


 I believe at a certain extent, outsiders are a influence because... young children these days look upto outsiders and see what other people to do! These kids want to be cool and what outsiders do they will want to do and act like. Groups value: Loyalty, Honestly, Capablity, POWER etc... Groups in school have many reasons not to like eachother... the way they dress, religion, who their friends are, how they look like etc... I think alot of it is based on fact but turns personal somewhere along the line because during the years whatever you have shared to your friends and soon or later you guys got into a rift, they will do things to get back at you... like telling something that only they were suppose to know but just to get popular and make everyone hate you, they spread a rumour like rapid fire. ALOT of it is based on rumours, half truths because people want to be accepted into groups and some ways they get accepted is by telling lies about other people, telling secrets of other people, and to pretty much ruining someones life just to be accepted.


 Another personal story: In grade 10 I was friends with everyone and the one that i thought that was my BESTFRIEND turned on me, she told everyone my secret... it spread like rapid fire, people were calling me names, they were judging.. but they didnt realize i am only human and if i didnt experience this in life... i would never learn from them... People were constanly judging me... But sooner or later the rumours and bullshit faded away. I was glad it was over and done with and that everyone liked me for who i am not what i have done... now when i see younger groups doing that i tell them  how its not right and how it can effect their life... Messages spread through Sullivan by one person gossiping to a friend and then its a chain. The DETAILS of the story makes everyone believe what they had heard... And they would ask other people if it was true or not... people would never ask the person their talking about what had happened.