Now this, is what I've been waiting for...

Rule #1: “Life is not fair. Get used to it.”

True. Nothing more I can say.

A lot of them I completely agree with, so lets paste them all in now, so we can just hold them all under the veil of "Indeed" and get to the point.

"Your school may have done away with winners and losers. Life hasn't."
"Looking like a slut does not empower you."
"Zero tolerance=zero common sense."
"If your butt has its own zip code, it's not because McDonald's forced you to eat all those Big Macs. If you smoke, it's not Joe Camel's fault."
“The real world won’t care as much as your school does about your self-esteem…."
"No matter what your daddy says, you are not a princess…."
"Life is more like dodgeball than your gym teacher thinks…."

However;

"Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity. Your grandparents had a different word for burger flipping. They called it opportunity.”

This may be true, to an extent, but for 90% of the people that get stuck flipping burgers day in/day out it isn't an opportunity. In fact, it represents - in it's entirety - their complete lack of opportunity.

Some of you may know that - when I'm not at Uni doing my Degree - I work the night shift at my local Sainsbury's. This is hardly the job I want, and I simply have it as a means of generating a little bit (well, quiet a lot really) extra cash to stop myself relying on my student loan too much. Most of the people I work with - both on nights and day staff - fall into the following few categories.

1) Immigrants

2) 2nd Job

3) Management

4) Students like myself

5) People that dropped out of school at 16, and have worked there ever since.

For the sake of this, groups 1, 2 and 4 can be ignored. The people in Management have never worked a day on the shop floor in their lives (I mean proper management, Store Manager, Shift Manager, Area Manager - you know the types). In fact, what they do actually have is a long winded career starting either out of Uni with a Management Degree, or the last time they actually worked shop was at least 10 years ago, in which things have changed, and are now somewhat different. Even then, maybe only 2% of the Low-End Management Positions are given to people of the latter category, and exactly 0% of the High-End.

So that leaves Group 5. Cashiers, Stock Replenishment, Warehouse - all the basic tedious things that no one else wants to do. Even if they get a few years experience, the only opportunity they have is moving to another store in the same chain (for a relative or maybe slightly higher paid job) but they all will hit their respective glass ceilings within about 3 years. This is not an opportunity, not by a long shot.

Today, if you don't have A-Levels, you are holding yourself back. Even NVQ's and GNVQ's are better than nothing.

Tomorrow, if you don't have a Bachelors Degree, you will be held back. Ironically, today a degree in Media/Film Studies will also hold you back, but the less said about that the better...also one from a bad University - which is why more and more employers are asking where you studied.

Hell, it can even be argued that my degree limits my options when compared to a degree in say, History, or English. However, I'd say you're talking shit, for this reason. My degree (Computer Science: Games and Virtual Environments) will let me - assuming I get a 1st/2-1 - work in the Games Industry, an Industry I want to work in. It will also let me do anything in IT - Server Administration, Software, Hardware, and anything else you can think of that uses computers. Now this may be a "limited area" even though the area is massive, but what it means is that I will actually be specialised in an area, and my skills will be greatly desired in that area. Broad degrees like English and History mean that you aren't specialised and we live in an economy where specialities and diversity are 2 of the most highly wanted traits of any applicants.

It also alludes to the fact that "It doesn't matter who you are, you may have the next big idea." People often cite how Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Richard Branson, The Bloke who starter Richer Sounds, Dyson and other such "inventors" of our time were sitting under the proverbial apple tree and got twated by a rather effective means of seed transportation. The fundamental flaw with this idea is that none of them sat on their arse doing nothing. Richer bought Audio Equipment on a Credit System, with the intention of selling it before he had to pay for it. It took Dyson over 10 years of anyone to pick up his idea, and when they did finally, it was a Venture Capital firm that financed him - hardly the best way to start a business. Gates and Jobs are both very, very intelligent men with an absolute fascination with electronics. Jobs and Woz built the first Apple computer is Woz' garage, and Gates was a code-monkey.

Even if you look at professional sports men, none of them were out playing in the park one day when a scout just so happened to be walking past (excluding maybe Ian Wright, but that is probably urban myth). They would play every day, get signed to local/youth teams, go through academy systems, etc etc etc. When I used to swim for county, I was training 4 times a week for 2 hours a time, until I had to stop due to a recurring shoulder-injury. Mataspore too was at an even higher level when he stopped, training at 5am every morning, every day of the week - at least. You simply will never get something for nothing, cold-fusion-of-ideas-and-lives just simply isn't possible....yet.

The bright among you will notice a hole in my argument, that I will plug with the aforementioned seed transporter. People could argue (assuming I make it of course) that I started off stacking shelves, and look at me now. This may be technically correct - if you wanna go even further back, I had a paper round when I was 12! - but you and I both know that this isn't what the author is eluding to. What he means is that you can have nothing, and get everything, as in, you are part of Group 5. The reason this isn't me is because whereas I may have nothing to show for it at this exact moment - beyond stressing out over exams - I (and others like me) are in a position to actually make something of ourselves. People in Group 5, given how much they have already hindered themselves by not having any sort of proper qualifications - GCSE's mean shit and we all know it - they don't have the opportunity, and thus the phrase is meaningless.

The rest of them, I agree with;

“You are not the first and you are not the only one who has gone through what you are going through…."

"Grown-ups forget how scary it is to be your age. Just remember: this too will pass.”

“Pi does not care what you think.”

"Don’t forget to say thank you.”

“Your sexual organs were not meant to engage in higher-order thinking or decision making.”

“You are not immortal.”

Except the last one, and that is a matter of principle. If we stood around all day in our little bubbles never trying anything new and dangerous, then life would a) become very boring very quick, and b) drastically change. Going back to the old idea of "What if Fleming threw out that mouldy sandwich!"

Scuzzmonkey....