By Cao Yuhan (24S03M)
Calm down, it’s not that serious.
The mugging culture in our school has gotten out of hand.
When you walk around the school on any weekday afternoon, you will be able to see mugging in action; students doing revision, watching lectures or completing their tutorials are scattered across the school. During exam periods especially, mugging becomes everyone’s after-school activity.
As if mugging itself is not exhausting enough, the emergence of mugger critics has introduced new challenges to mugging culture.
If you encounter a mugger critic during a study session, they will advise you to stop studying and loosen up. They may complain you are too competitive and trying too hard to get good grades.
One would expect mugging culture to be praised in our society as there is traditionally a large emphasis on hard work and good grades. However, mugging culture and muggers have started to receive criticism over this practice. With more posts about the stressful mugging culture in Singapore surfacing online and increased judgement towards students who mug, is mugging socially acceptable?
Types of Muggers
1. The Stereotypical Mugger
The “stereotypical mugger” activities consist of hustling even during holidays, studying for several hours a day, staying up late or waking up early to work. The list is non-exhaustive.
I believe every student has engaged in “stereotypical mugger” activities before. Despite being laborious, “stereotypical mugger” activities typically help us achieve the results we desire.
Since witnessing the mugging madness during examination seasons, it is safe to say that mugging forms a large part of our school life.
However, you are bound to meet someone who will claim they never had to mug during your time as a student.
For students who deny any engagement in mugger activities, they may fall into the next category of muggers.
2. The Closet Mugger
“I didn’t study that much” is likely a favourite statement from this group of muggers.
Closet muggers mug in secret. They may downplay the intensive study sessions they had when asked how sufficiently they have prepared for an exam.
Closet muggers are subjected to the most criticism. Because they are so secretive in the way they work, people tend to feel distaste for them because they seemingly achieve good results without having to work hard for them. Many may find it annoying that they relentlessly talk about how little effort they put into schoolwork but still manage to score well.
I understand how the dismissal of their efforts can be unbearable at times. However, there is nothing wrong in choosing to be discrete or subtle about their studying, in my opinion.
Dismissing their efforts could likely be a coping mechanism to soften their disappointment when they receive results that are not up to their expectations.
3. The Last-minute Mugger
Last-minute muggers cram information before timed practices, quizzes and exams.
With their busy schedules, it is difficult to make time for revision consistently. When assessments are randomly and suddenly announced, last-minute cramming is the best option.
“I perform better when I mug the night before.” Y6 student said when asked about her mugging habits. “The content is more fresh in my head.”
While last-minute mugging is a widely practised technique, it remains the last-ditch attempt at preparing for tests.
Most last-minute muggers express that they would prefer more preparation time for the important tests. However, they are also unsure if announcing tests earlier would even truly motivate them to study earlier anyway.
The Non-Mugger
Non-muggers do not mug at all. But do they exist?
It is perfectly reasonable for someone to dislike mugging activities. However, most of us continue to mug because it is a necessary activity.
I doubt non-muggers truly exist because surely everyone has mugged in their life before out of necessity. Thus, I find it hypocritical when people condemn others for mugging because it is very likely that they too are mugging every chance they get.
Can you stop mugging?
Mugging culture exacerbates the fear of missing out. When we see a classmate working hard, we naturally feel like we’re losing out because the notion of staying competitive has been ingrained in many of us from a young age.
However, many resort to passing less-than-positive comments to the muggers around them.
There is a tendency to (intentionally or unintentionally) make those who are openly doing more work feel self-conscious. When criticism is targeted towards muggers, it comes across as guilt-tripping people to stop studying.
Imagine it is Friday and you are 2 weeks behind on your lectures because of your CCA commitments throughout the week.
Your friend who has completed their work sees you studying during breaks and tells you to relax.
“You’re crazy, you’re always mugging. Just chill out.”
Upon hearing this, you put your notes away to attend to your friend while the work continues to pile.
Even if one is way ahead of their peers, witnessing others working hard will still instil a fear of missing out.
By lamenting to muggers about the stress one feels from watching them study, and sometimes blaming them for working too hard, it seems like an intentional attempt at making the muggers feel guilty for adding pressure to their peers or not spending time with people enough.
Additionally, criticism is often aimed at people engaging in mugger activities, instead of the culture of mugging itself. Condemning students for doing activities that they ought to do is unreasonable when naysayers mug too.
Don’t hate the player
As a last-minute mugger, I admire people who are able to stick to a consistent schedule. While last-minute mugging is not the most ideal, I take comfort in knowing that I have tried.
Talking to students who identify as stereotypical muggers, they express that they do not bear much thought to other people’s perceptions of them. “It does affect me, but I remember that I have a lot of things to do.”
In my opinion, mugging culture can be a stressful experience for many, but criticism of muggers fosters a toxic study culture.
Criticism aimed at muggers will result in an even more competitive environment. We have established that mugging is an integral part of school life. Discouraging others from studying would only result in people wanting to ‘hide’ their study sessions from their peers and be less transparent about their hard work.
It fosters a toxic form of closet mugging, where not only would we want to conceal our efforts, but we may discredit our hard work and hurt ourselves with self-deprecation.
The criticism that muggers receive will not make the mugging culture go away. Hence, it’s probably more productive to be supportive and look out for your fellow muggers.
Every student has their own strategy in the game of mugging. Don’t hate the player!
To all muggers: take care of yourself, take breaks, happy mugging!
Such a relatable topic to the school community, and yet it is being written so well! Love it so much <3