Despite having always been a very strong person when it comes to handling abuse and harassment, I'm finding myself a little crushed by a recent bout of "indirect bullying" that I experienced at university last year.
A little background. I'm a UK student from one of the poorest areas of the country and from a state funded school. I was always top of my classes in everything and secured a place at a world class university, where I study on a course of 30 students. Nearly every single one of those 30 students hail from expensive public schools (think St. Paul's and so on) and are from wealthy backgrounds. I am also the only ethnically Asian (Pakistani) person on the course -- the rest are mainly American and British.
I have always had very high self esteem and didn't actually notice these "differences" that separate me from my peers until now (three years into my course), when a few remarks from an American coursemate brought me back to earth.
We were discussing graduate offers for medicine at the time. The American had just been accepted on the undergraduate programme at Glasgow. He mentioned that he planned on practising as a doctor in the US in the future (he grew up in Germany). Not sure if he was right, but he then remarked that he was going to study medicine at Glasgow because it was one of the few medical schools the US recognised and so it would apparently put him in a stronger position than other candidates when applying to the best private US hospitals. At the time, my plans were similar and so I said I was hoping to be accepted by Oxbridge/UCL in the hopes that I could study at a university the US actually knew about...my plans are to move to the US as well after graduation.
His face looked so pissed off (?) instantly. First, he pretended he hadn't understood (everyone else had) and made fun of me for thinking Oxbridge wasn't recognised in the US...basically the exact opposite of what I HAD said. I told him he had misunderstood. He then paused and said "Wait, do you even HAVE an American passport?" I'm not sure if I'm wrong, but it seemed as though he was mocking me.
I have to wonder why he behaved like that. His seemingly snide behaviour definitely knocked my confidence and now I'm struggling to think of myself as "equal" to my wealthier peers. I keep thinking that I'm beneath them, and that I shouldn't have big aspirations. That I should basically know my place in life and stay there.
More than anything, I just want to know what this boy's psychology was during this conversation, in the hopes that I can understand why a student who is SO kind to everyone else insisted on belittling me that day.
Put the internet to work for you.
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