With 2012 having come to a close, now is a good time to look back and reflect on the choices JCHS students have made, especially when following fads. Fads have spread through the school like wildfire and almost everyone is guilty of it from time to time. They aren’t necessarily a bad thing, just something that students may look back on and question why they ever followed it in the first place. They range from phases shouted down the hall, fashion choices to poses in photographs.
A student at JCHS can’t go a day without hearing someone shout down the hall, “Whatever, YOLO!” The phrase “you only live once” become popularized by the singer Drake and now kids everywhere are saying it constantly. Generally people say yolo to justify something silly they have done or claim that they will do, usually with no follow-through. However some feel that yolo could have significant meaning. The message behind yolo is a positive one. The idea that a person only has one life and they should do something important with it and fulfill their dreams is more than just a fad. Whichever way one looks at it, yolo has definitely made the top five fads of 2012 in JCHS.
Another fad is hashtags. Hashtags have become popularized from Twitter, however the phrase has quickly spread beyond social media and into the high school. The purpose of saying hashtag is still somewhat unknown. Why students feel the need to say for example “#APEnglishProblems” when they receive a difficult assignment isn’t clear, but they do it anyway. This is the nature of fads; kids do it just because it’s the popular thing to do at the time. Like yolo, students rarely go a day without hearing hashtag a hundred times.
Fads aren’t just phrases; they can also be fashion choices or other materialistic items. One of the biggest fashion fads are the large glasses many kids have started to wear. Nicknamed “hipster glasses” the large rectangular frames with rounded edges have become a common sight in the halls of JCHS and are a fashion choice made by many this past year.
Technology can also be considered a fad. The iPhone5, for example, has become the phone to have for teenagers everywhere. The slightly larger and lighter iPhone has flooded the school and have become probably the most commonly used smartphone in the school. This fad won’t be going away too soon however, many students say it was on their holiday wish lists or asked for it as a birthday gift.
Last but not least in the top five fads of 2012 here at JCHS is the most amusing by far. This is a pose commonly known as the “duck face” and it has spread through the school rapidly over this past year. This face that kids make to take silly pictures is more commonly used by girls but lately guys have even been making duck faces to poke fun at the girls who tend to use the pose often. Whether or not girls originally made this face semi-seriously or not, the duck face has become a joking and silly pose this year.
These are just a few fads that have become extremely popular during the 2012 school year and will undoubtedly be replaced soon enough with the arrival of 2013. Looking back on this year many students will probably laugh at the fads of 2012 as well as themselves.
