Stories of Humiliation

[todd]

Another good school one happened when I was in sixth grade. I was very shy, and pretty much only had one friend until I was in seventh grade, so I was still hesitant to talk to anybody. So, we're in class, and the teacher announces that we should form ourselves into groups. Being unpopular, I decide to just wait until everyone makes their groups and just join the one that's short one or two kids. This time, that group had three or four kids who were considerably more popular than I was. I go to sit at their table, and a popular guy looks at me as I start to sit down and says, "Don't sit at our table. We don't want you." So, I get up and look around for another group to join, but, seeing as I never really talked to anybody, I'd never dealt with that kind of rejection before. It hurts a lot, and I start to cry. It's soft at first and I can hide it, but it gets heavier, and I start shaking/heaving gently and tears are running down my face. The teacher sees me and forces the popular kids to accept me into their group. I'm unable to help with whatever project we're doing because I'm still crying, and the kid who told me off leans toward me and tries to reassure me and get me to stop crying, but it just makes me feel worse. And all this time, I have to try and come to terms with the fact that I just exposed myself as a sensitive dork in front of everyone in my class.

How did you stop crying? I could use some of that now. Whew.  Someone must be chopping onions ..somewhere ... in this office .. at 10am. 

I want to go back in time and be best friends with that little kid.

Really? I want to go back in time and take his lunch money! Kid seems like an easy mark.

[John Junk 2.0]

Sixth grade set the bar for humiliation and no other humiliations since have been able to compare.  When I was in sixth grade my journal went missing for a few weeks.  We had to keep journals for English class.  Mine went missing.  I figured I'd lost it at my house. 

Well, little did I know one of my "friends" had stolen it and was reading it with a bonafide enemy of mine.

Iin the many years before this one guy eventually came out of the closet he committed himself to emulating all the worst aspects of the fairer sex.  I think this was like his survival tactic, was to be ten times as mean as any non-effeminate dude.  He was the kind of person who would talk shit about you crying at your birthday party four days after sept. 11th!  Just a real gossip-turd.  Well, he had basically memorized portions of my journal and recited them back to me in gym class.  This was also a day where we had to do an obstacle course.  So this guy recited portions of my journal to me (which had stuff like word association games and half-assed beatnik experiments that he duly mocked in front of as many people as possible) and I got so mad I actually made a little speech like in a movie, where I assured him that even though my friends may be "losers" they were at least my real friends*, unlike his fake friends or whatever.  Then I challenged him to a fight.  Then I had to run the damn obstacle course.  I had to crawl under things and run through tires or whatever.  It was the final crotch-kick to my tattered dignity.

Anyway, that dude never fought me.  I was waiting to fight him and he showed up with some girls and said he didn't have time to fight me that day. 

Three years later I was friends with this guy and was in a band with the other guy who initially stole my journal in the first place.  Say Lah Veee.






*Which wasn't totally true.  They were definitely the only people who would talk to me in this hour of my life, but I didn't actually like them very much as they were all pretty small-minded and boring.

[erika]

Ever pee your pants when you were 7 because you were at a roller skating party and were too uncoordinated to get your pants down in time because you still had your skates on?

Cuz I did.

[Steeley Chris]

1988, summer camp, my sixth birthday, and I get handcuffed to a fire pole. I can't remember the circumstances other than I was a shrimpy sensitive redheaded little kid.

The twentieth anniversary of this humiliating event will be this Saturday.

[iAmBaronVonTito]

i dont seem to have any stories of humiliation that come to mind.  although, everyone else seems to have something stemming from high school (or younger).  when i think about those years, im convinced i was humiliated and embarrassed, but nothing comes to mind.

perhaps this is a story of serious denial.

[AllisonLeGnome]

This is a simple one. I was a senior in high school. It was lunchtime. The cafeteria was on the bottom level of the building, so there were big pillars all around the room. Of course, there were a lot of circular tables where students could eat. The bell rings, signaling the end of lunch. I get up and take my tray to the designated tray area. Students are slow to file out, and the cafeteria is still very much full. For some reason, I decide to cut through the tables as I leave, instead of simply walking around them. One table is directly across from a pillar, and the only thing blocking my path between these two obstacles is a chair. I decide to just jump on top of the chair, then jump to the floor and go on my way. So, I jump, but instead of landing perfectly straight on the chair as I'd planned, I land at too much of an angle, push the chair forward with my body weight and land flat on my back in front of half the student body. And EVERYBODY laughed. Some pointed. I tried to laugh along and play it off, but it wasn't happening. That was embarrassing.

I realize it's a little late to help you now, Matt, but there's a way to play that one off should something similar ever happen again: Pretend to be badly injured. You can see this successfully work anytime somebody spectacularly blows a play in the outfield in baseball or screws up on coverage in defense in football. Shaming people into not laughing will always be the final refuge of the embarrassed.

Not true. In our freshman year of high school my friend tripped and just shattered his arm (I had to carry around his books for the last few weeks of the year) and people laughed.

[Denim Gremlin]

This is a simple one. I was a senior in high school. It was lunchtime. The cafeteria was on the bottom level of the building, so there were big pillars all around the room. Of course, there were a lot of circular tables where students could eat. The bell rings, signaling the end of lunch. I get up and take my tray to the designated tray area. Students are slow to file out, and the cafeteria is still very much full. For some reason, I decide to cut through the tables as I leave, instead of simply walking around them. One table is directly across from a pillar, and the only thing blocking my path between these two obstacles is a chair. I decide to just jump on top of the chair, then jump to the floor and go on my way. So, I jump, but instead of landing perfectly straight on the chair as I'd planned, I land at too much of an angle, push the chair forward with my body weight and land flat on my back in front of half the student body. And EVERYBODY laughed. Some pointed. I tried to laugh along and play it off, but it wasn't happening. That was embarrassing.

I realize it's a little late to help you now, Matt, but there's a way to play that one off should something similar ever happen again: Pretend to be badly injured. You can see this successfully work anytime somebody spectacularly blows a play in the outfield in baseball or screws up on coverage in defense in football. Shaming people into not laughing will always be the final refuge of the embarrassed.

Not true. In our freshman year of high school my friend tripped and just shattered his arm (I had to carry around his books for the last few weeks of the year) and people laughed.

that reminds of a similar humilating and hilarious story that happened to a friend of mine in high school. he was playing basketball in gym and in an effort to look cool jumped up and hung from the rim like he had just dunked a ball. instead someone came up and pulled his shorts down and while he tried in vain to pull them back up he fell off and broke his arm.

[Gilly]

Ever pee your pants when you were 7 because you were at a roller skating party and were too uncoordinated to get your pants down in time because you still had your skates on?

Cuz I did.

No, but I did while playing little league baseball trying to hold it in until the end of the game. To make matters worse I rolled in the dirt to try to hide it... I could have blamed my water bottle but the dirt really made it look obvious. Pretty humiliating.

[ericluxury]

Ever pee your pants when you were 7 because you were at a roller skating party and were too uncoordinated to get your pants down in time because you still had your skates on?

Cuz I did.

How about peeing your pants in school in 7th grade? I did that. Was talking to a friend and we were both peeing. I hadn't fully gotten myself out of my pants and the pee went all over my leg. Luckily a well placed backpack and rushing to a hiding spot got me completely out of it. Never caught.

[Sarah]

everyone else seems to have something stemming from high school (or younger).

Perhaps the wounds inflicted by more recent humiliations are still too tender for people to poke at them here.

[gravy boat]

Perhaps the wounds inflicted by more recent humiliations are still too tender for people to poke at them here.

very tender

I want to send you a copy of Blueberry Boat ( and multiple magazine subscriptions).

I liked it better the first time when it was called the "Into The Woods" soundtrack.

[erika]

I was pretty humiliated the time I was at a conference and 20,000 blue brochures showed up that were supposed to have been printed in purple. (I accidentally picked the wrong pantone color... and then got screamed at in a convention center like I was a disobedient child. I was 21.)

[dave from knoxville]

*********  ADULT STORY FOLLOWS   *********

The first time I was close to having sex I was 18 and had just graduated high school.  The willing lady -- my girlfriend of 2 months -- was more experienced.  It was a hot summer afternoon and her parents were at work.  I must have paid no attention in sex ed. because when I went to put on the condom I completely unrolled it and then tried to shimmy it over my thing. I struggled for I think hours and was sweating profusely. She finally snorted "What are you doing?"

We did not have sex that day.

I left her house soon after and spent the rest of the day driving around. 

I am piggy-backing on gravyboat's first time sex story. Emma, pay attention; this is one of the stories I owe you.

When I was 17 I started dating my supervisor (at the employee's cafeteria of Opryland, for those of you familiar with my Roy Acuff story), who was 18. I was scheduled to be off one day, and she called early, saying she was sick, wasn't going in to work, and wondered if I could drop in to look in on her. OK, I say. Curiously, she wants to know the time I am going to drop by. We settle on noon. Humiliations abound.

1) When I arrive, she answers the door in what, in hindsight, was probably a carefully chosen lovely seductive night-gown/teddy/bustier, but all I can think is "Good God, she looks like Miss Kitty."

2) Almost immediately, she is on me; the extent of my experience in this arena to date has been neck-and-above kissing, with occasional (confusing) pants-on-pants gyrations. I have never even, as they say, "awarded myself". Somehow we wind up on her bed. At some point, I swear to God, she calls me "Pete", who she has not dated for nearly 3 months.

3) The clock radio is softly playing. The song? WINCHESTER CATHEDRAL. Without trying to get all graphic, my back is to the mattress. I remember looking over the side of the bed and seeing a pile of our inter-mingled clothes.

4) She leans into my ear, and whispers something that indicates that I should not, uh, let go of my essence, but, alas, I have to inform her that her request is far too late; the actual "encounter" lasted about 2 seconds, and has been over since the second chorus of WINCHESTER CATHEDRAL.

5) The door from the garage to the kitchen swings open and hits the wall. Her dad is home, unexpectedly. Lucky for us, she rushes to her door where she spots him entering the far end of the kitchen. With a woman. Who is not his wife. With her best little girl voice, my girlfriend says "Daddy?", and he runs to his car with his female friend and drives away.

I can not tell you the number of times WINCHESTER CATHEDRAL has played in my head during subsequent romantic moments, but it's more than 10, and it's crippling.

[Amplituden]

When I was in grade eight, I got a new pair of red converse high top sneakers.
I thought they were really cool.
When I proudly bounded in to my Grade 8 classroom a bunch of kids started loudly making fun of me.  The teacher was not in the room yet.
I was just standing there and three or four people were making fun on me for wearing red converse sneakers as the class looked on and laughed at me.
I kept my composure, and said in a loud voice "WHY DON'T YOU ALL FUCK OFF".
Then I turned around and noticed my teacher standing there.  I immediately started crying and had to go to the principals office.
I didn't let the bastards bring me down though, I still wore my converse.

[iAmBaronVonTito]

amplituden: whats funny is now their kids are wearing red converse sneakers.  so now they can all go, well...yes.

dfk: WHAT?!