Prep School Wants To Ban BFFs So Stop Letting Your Kid Weave Those Friendship Bracelets

School Wants To Ban Best FriendsDo you guys remember your best friend from when you were little? Of course you do! There is nothing like having a really close friend when you are tiny, someone who always save you a seat on the bus, someone who will share their gum with you, someone who will present you with stick figure crayon drawings of the both of you wearing crowns and holding hands. Best friends are the best! BFF forever! Because I don’t get out much I consider you guys my BFFs and even though we don’t live close enough to share Bonnie Bell lip gloss I totally would! BUT, not if we went to this leading prep school that thinks that this whole BFF things is a very bad idea. From The Telegraph:

 

Some parents of pupils at Thomas’s private day school in Battersea, South-West London, have been told that their children cannot have best friends, The Telegraph understands.

Ben Thomas, the school’s headmaster, said there was no official policy to that effect but he supported the idea.

He said: ”There is sound judgment behind it. You can get very possessive friendships, and it is much easier if they share friendships and have a wide range of good friends rather than obsessing too much about who their best friend is.

”I would certainly endorse a policy which says we should have lots of good friends, not a best friend.

I guess I can sort of see the logic behind it, especially when it go on to add:

Mr Thomas said young girls in particular were prone to forming close-knit friendship ”triangles” that often ended with one member of the group feeling excluded and upset.

He added: ”I think children would be more balanced in their friendships if they all grew up knowing they all need to be friends with each other.

”These obsessive friendships can be very hurtful for those who are left out of them, and ostracising is as painful as physical bullying.

 

But come on! Having a best friend is normal and kids hurt each other’s feelings and feel left out and all that other playground drama and this is where parents step in and explain to them all about how kids shouldn’t exclude each other and make the kids not part of the BFF inner-circle feel left out. You can’t ban best friends because love cannot be banned! I think that the school should focus more on any resulting bullying that happens rather than trying to thwart this whole BFF thing to begin with, or else have school-wide assemblies explaining how bullying isn’t tolerated and how to be a good friend to everyone.

I’m not sure how the school could ban BFFs anyway, because the kids will just call each other by another term of endearment. I think focusing on the positive is a better idea than trying to take away the notion of best friends. I am totally running up to my room and slamming my door and crying into my pillow right now!

(Photo: Monkey Business Images/shutterstock)

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