He probably knew "how to manage social contact" just fine. I did, too, in high school and before -- I had no problems at all communicating with adults. The problem is that the situation in school isn't social contact in the way that it will occur in the real world, it's prison.
In real life, we don't shake our heads at people who've been assaulted or had a swastika or cross burned in front of their house and say that they should try to manage social contact with others better. Instead, we treat the oppressors as the criminals they are.
Prison and school are in fact natural, it's civilized society that's takes effort and breaks down under stress.
And I think coping in a Lord of the Flies like environment is part of being human. We can not easily extend the adult civilized structure into childhood. Only in extremely tightly controlled environments does that sort of work.
It might be realistic for kids, because kids aren't socialized as adults. In fact, we've deliberately delayed socializing them as adults more and more, and I think that's a grave error, which we've only been able to afford because we're so wealthy as a society. I think there are enormous costs, not only in the "educational" system that delays education more and more, but in the costs of that delay on the productive lifespan of people once they're finally accept as "adult", some 5-10 years after they were physiologically adult.
I'm reminded of a story Diamond(?) tells of two Polynesian(?) strangers meeting in the road. They start talking about common family or friends they might have. They are looking for an excuse not to kill each other.
Diamond is far from the only one to write about tribal killings in Papua New Guinea. That doesn't mean he didn't make it up, but if he did make something up it probably wouldn't be something easily proven wrong.
And yet there were many peers who knew how to communicate with each other and adults. Being able to adapt to your environment isn't a skill everyone has. He admits he was socially inept, that's not a rare thing in school.
It's not and I have never said it was. I just said he didn't have it all together. Sounds like he still has social problems--instead of facing people who used to not talk to him he'd rather tell them to fuck off on the internet. Works for him I guess, but that's the whole reason why he was targeted in the first place. It's sad that happened to him, but I bet everyone who messaged him has no idea of what his memories of highschool are like. They never got to know him but assume he had a good time like they did.
That's not the behavior he was upset about. Speaking personally, I'd have been ecstatic if people not talking to me were the worst I had to put up with in high school, and I had it a lot easier than he did, from his description.
In real life, we don't shake our heads at people who've been assaulted or had a swastika or cross burned in front of their house and say that they should try to manage social contact with others better. Instead, we treat the oppressors as the criminals they are.