Club Member: I would like to request that you advise me on how to deal with the TOXIC CLIQUINESS of various organizations on this campus.
Dear Club Member,
As usual, I would like to thank you for writing to Sage Advice to ask for support. As I prefaced in my first column, I’ll do my best to speak from personal experience and give you some semblance of an answer to the perennial problem of “toxic cliquiness.”
While your request doesn’t include much detail on the exact predicament you find yourself in, I am well-versed in the inevitable tensions and feelings of contempt that can brew between students on this campus.
Groups — whether due to bold personalities, ambitious goals or a competitive work environment — can often form within the ranks of a larger organization to produce this phenomenon that you, myself and many others have encountered through the trials of campus life. When these groups within groups eventually become entrenched over time and turn hierarchical, their mere existence — good or bad — can begin to define every aspect of spending time with a club.
This can create an environment that is discouraging and downright demoralizing for members who don’t identify with the in-group — never mind those who simply joined the organization late or aren’t able to participate as often. In my encounters with club-adopted cliques, I’ve often felt it impossible to escape the pervading group norms or adopt the perfect personality needed to fit into a preexisting social fabric. Even more, I’ve found that involving myself with just one organization at a time has often left me more vulnerable to the effects of toxic cliques.
While an easy fallback on college campuses, resist the temptation to let your classes and clubs define every aspect of your social circle and sense of self. From my experience, it simply isn’t healthy to lean on a single campus group for all of your needs, and rarely is an organization capable of doing so. Every group offers something different — whether that be friendship, professional skills or competitive fervor — so find a few that appeal to you and figure out what exactly you hope to get out of the time you spend with them. Toxic cliquiness can be a difficult problem to grapple with, but finding multiple sources of community can make you more resistant to its effects.
I hope my advice, however vague, can help you navigate the murky waters of toxic cliquiness and traverse the social peaks, canyons and plateaus often found at Tufts.
Sincerely,
Matthew Sage
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