Describe a phony that you know, have seen, or have read about. Include an incident that shows how the person looks, acts around others, or speaks. Be sure to describe the person's mannerisms as a whole.
It would be interesting if you incorporate Holden's description of Sally and her friend into your paragraph response. Feel free to respectfully comment on your classmates' responses.
I have interacted with many phonies in the past, but I'm going to describe a particular incident that I saw in a movie where one phony in particular stood out to me. The movie is called "Mean Girls" and the phony that I'm referring to is one of the main characters named, Regina George. She is one of the biggest phonies I have ever seen in my entire life. In fact, she is so phony that she makes the people around her turn into phonies, just from being around her for a period of time. One incident of when she was phony was when she turned to a girl in her grade and complimented her skirt. As soon as the girl was out of ear shot, she turned to her "friend" and talked about how it was the ugliest skirt she's ever seen. She obviously has not heard of the statement if you don't have anything nice to say then you shouldn't say it at all. This girl that moved to the school, named Kady Herring, turned phony through all of the phony people in the school. She was once a true wholesome girl that had morals and was kind and generous to everyone, but the "phoniness" got to her and sucked her in like a tornado. She then started lying to her family and the people that she truly loved. This ties is when Holden talks about how phony Sally is to the boy. She says one thing to her face, but I bet if he wasn't there, she would have a different opinion of the boy.
ReplyDeleteDuring my first few years at camp I encountered a ‘phony.’ Although she has changed greatly over the seven years I’ve known her, this girl, Ali definitely fit the definition of a phony when I first met her. We met in 2005 during my first summer at sleep away camp. It was her third summer attending Tripp Lake, so needless to say, she knew her way around. I figured I might as well get to know her and become friendly with her because I knew she’d fill me in on everything I needed to know and do during my first summer. I vividly remember going up to her on the first or second day of camp to introduce myself. I walked nervously up to her with a smile and said, “HI! I’m Amy what’s your name?!” From her first words I could tell what a phony she was. She responded, “OH MY GOD HI!! I’M ALI! OH MY GOD ARE YOU NEW? YOU ARE GOING TO LOVE IT HERE! IT’S THE MOST AMAZING PLACE EVER!”
ReplyDeleteSimilar to the way Holden describes Sally’s voice in chapter seventeen, I immediately thought to myself, “could her voice be any more obnoxious and overpowering?” In addition to her voice, her mannerisms and personality as a whole were clearly fake. It was evident that she wanted to win the spirit award at the end of the summer, for she constantly attempted to control my age group and be seen as the nicest most outgoing girl of us all. As the summer continued, Ali’s phoniness became even more apparent. Rather than participating in a weeklong color war like most camps, my camp engages in color war-like activities all summer long. On the third night of camp we campers elect 4 captains from the oldest age group to lead the four teams. Being elected as a captain is a HUGE honor, and it is the responsibility of the captains to announce their teams the following day in front of the entire camp. As campers of the second youngest age group, my friends and I all looked up and marveled at the captains. For days after the teams were announced, the girls in my age group and I would take turns imitating the captains as they announced their teams. While my bunkmates and I were happy with whichever captain we could imitate, Ali of course insisted on being the funniest, prettiest captain. As if this desire to be ‘perfect’ wasn’t phony enough, she repetitively implied to us that she was dying to be a captain when we became the oldest age group. She phrased this advice for us to nominate her in a way that we wouldn’t sense how badly she wanted it. Clearly she was unsuccessful, for the majority of my age group knew about her selfish desire.
Now, seven years later, the thirty seven girls in my age group are impatiently awaiting the 233 days left until we can refer to ourselves as the oldest girls in camp. This summer it will be four girls from my age group that will be the captains of the four teams, and the younger girls will look up to us and imitate the things that we do. In a way, Ali can still be considered a phony, because we are still all aware that part of her still longs to be elected as a captain, and additionally, she continues to make herself seem overbearing and fake to others.
I have encounter phonies in books movies and in real life and the one i would like to chose to talk about is holden from Catcher in the rye. holden feels that life is full of crap and everyone is a phony but the only one that really is a phony in this book is holden. for example when he got on the train to go to new york city he confronted a students mom. And he was as he said shooting the crap by lying to her about his name his life and that he had cancer. Holden was a liar and in my book that makes him a phony. Holden is always walking around and judging people from the way they look and saying if they don't look right they are a phony and i ever knew them i would never be true to them. By saying and doing that makes you a phony because you are juding people by they way they are different from you and if there not like holden he thinks they are fake and phonies. But really he is the real phony because of they way he does and encounters things in life
ReplyDeleteBrian goldstein
I have read about several phonies in my life. One phony that I have read about is Luce. In chapter 19, Holden and Luce talk at a bar and Luce thought that Holden was asking him questions that were too personal. Then Holden remembered how Luce acted in Whooton. "When we were at Whooton, he'd make you describe the most personal stuff that happened to you, but if you started asking him questions about himself, he got sore."(p.147) Luce was a phony because he made other people answer questions which he wouldn't even answer himself. At the same time, Holden is another phony in this book because he said that it annoyed him when Luce would ask personal questions, but Holden was doing the same thing to Luce.
ReplyDeleteA memorable encounter I had with a phony was with this girl I worked with named Jackie. The first day I had met her she came over to me ecstatic to meet a new person. It seemed as if we were best friends and had been forever due to her overwhelmingly friendly attitude. This was my first summer working there and had not known her as well as others. Every morning Jackie would act in a fake persona and give me a huge hug welcoming me. But as I walked by her she would give me a dirty look up until the last second plastered an obnoxious smile on her face. The whole week she had stayed with me and befriended me and complementing my wardrobe. At that moment I felt like Holden Caufield when Sally stated, “Promise me you’ll let your hair grow. Crew cuts are getting corny. And your hair’s so lovely,” he responded with, “lovely my ass.” Jackie’s mannerism was clearly fake to me as well as everyone else’s that summer.
ReplyDeleteCasey Rinker
I met a really big phony two years ago when i went to camp, everyone moved into their cabins and were really excited to met each other. Well there was this one girl Sydney who was sweet and nice just like the rest of us. But as the days went on and we got to know each other better things changed. Sydney would pretend to be friends with one girl then go right to the other cabin and make fun of her or mock her. Things actually became pretty vicious so i knew from the begining to stay away from her because drama just wasn't worth the trouble.Soon enough no one liked her because she kept lieing and being fake to everyone, thus showing how being fake/ a phony can never benefit you. Having that need to act like someone your truely not is just wrong and can end up just bringing more problems to your life, now only if Sydney could learn that.
ReplyDeleteLaura McKinsey
I have met many phonies in my life before. But one of the phonies that stood out to me is one of my "friends". She was nice to me and she told me we were best friends. So we shared secrets and everything to together, But one day we were in another friends house and I said I had to go to the bathroom. When I was about to get back to room with my "best friend" and other friends, I heard my "best friend" say all the secrets I told her to them and she told bad things about me to them too. I heard everything she said but she didn't see how I was behind the door to the room, listening. When she told everything she had to say, I went back to the room and acted as if nothing happened and I interacted with that person normaly. I noticed that she was just acting as if she was my friend which shocked me completley. But the next day, I decided not to talk to her anymore. Since that girl did not know that I heard everything she said, she still does not know what bad thing she has done to hurt me.
ReplyDeleteMaya Ogura
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ReplyDeleteAt first glance the word “phony” seems to be fairly self-explanatory, but as one progresses through the novel, Catcher in the Rye, it becomes evident that the word “phony” has a deeper meaning. Essentially “phony” is a term used to describe someone or something that appears to be one thing, but is entirely another. Holden possesses a combination of fear and hatred for "phonies" and he feels the adult world is “phony”; everyone in it, and everything associated with it. Holden never actually states that he is afraid of growing up, but instead he expresses his resistance to maturing by characterizing the “adult world” as a place full of “phony”, dishonest, and shallow people in comparison to the honest, innocent, and fun world of a child. Holden exhibits insecurity, so to make himself feel better he exercises the power to condemn people for the way they behave, which essentially makes him the biggest “phony” of all. I experienced a situation similar to Holden’s encounter with George on his date with Sally, except my situation would increase Holden’s disgust to an entirely new level in comparison to what he felt in the presence of Sally and George. I was out with one of my good friends to dinner when we ran into a girl who used to go to school with us before she enrolled in private school. I hadn’t spoken to the girl in a couple of years but new what was generally going on in her life due to someone else I kept in close touch with who enrolled in the same private school. As we began to talk about our lives in recent years, the girl completely exaggerated and lied about what she had been up to since she left schools. She was speaking as though she had said what seemed like a speech over a thousand times; that this was something she rehearsed. What bothered me most was how she acted as though she were better than my friend and I, and that she had experienced so much more when it was all just a lie! What the girl didn’t know was how I was aware of what she had been doing lately and that I knew she was lying. I chose to be the bigger person and not embarrass her. Although I felt like putting her in her place I didn’t say anything about what I secretly knew. Inside I was absolutely astonished how she believed she could just makeup an entirely different life than the one she was living in attempt to impress my friend and I who hadn’t seen her in years. I was also puzzled by what her motivation was in making up all these lies and why she felt the need to impress us with fake relationships with gorgeous boys and lavish trips to Europe that never occurred. This quote from Catcher in the Rye reminds me exactly of what I experienced, “Then he and old Sally started talking about a lot of people they both knew. It was the phoniest conversation you ever heard in your life. They both kept thinking of places as fast as they could, then they’d think of somebody that lived there and mention their name.” (pg 127-128). In this quote Sally and George are almost competing to impress one another, which was exactly what the girl was trying to do to my friend and I. Part of what I defined Holden’s definition of a phony as was shallow, superficial, fake, untruthful, or hypocritical individuals. This definition relates directly back to why the girl I ran into can be classified as a phony, and how she may even be a competitor against Sally for rank as queen of the phonies.
ReplyDeleteNicole Suozzo
I have dealt with a lot of phonies before but just recently an inident happend with my friend where she acted like a phony. In my opinion a phony is someone that acts fake and differently around others. My friend saidsomething that was rude toward another person so i decided to confront her about it. When i confronted her she acted like she had no idea what i was talking about and denined that she ever said it. This bothered me for a fact because i knew what she said yet sher kept on lieing to my face about. This shows that she was being fake and therefore acting like a phony. In the catcher in the rye, Sally was being a phonie when she was with Holden. She saw someone she knew and decided to say hi to them. She acted like she was best friends with this person when meanwhile she probablyy only met them once. Sally did this to try and seem popular and that she had many friends. This shows that she is a phony.
ReplyDeleteOlivia m
One person that i have seen that are phonies are the people on the jersey shore. They all go around dressed like guidos and all want to look act and be cool, when the reality is that they are just a few people who have no regard for their future. The fact is that these people are
ReplyDeletereally big phonies because they probably are lying about who they are and what they like to do so that they seem cool to other when really they are throwing away their future. These sort of people make me sad to think about what they are going to do when they are 55 years old and pumping gas or working in a grocery store. All because they decided to be phonies when they were 20 what a shame.
-Theo Gevirtz
Being a phony generally relates to people that don't act as who they really are and are afraid or timid to show what they really are deep inside. once one of my friends acted as though he's very tough but he actuallly is a very nice person indside. He was always like look how strong i am and, i can bet the *$$&* out of anyone but thats not who he really is as a human being. like theo said the people who play the jersey shore act like a bunch of guidos but some of them aren't even italian, snookies argentinian. these kind of people are truely PHONIES!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteAh..Phonies..such a common misconception used by people at times when they find people not 'genuine' enough, but really is a cruel word...NOT... I can name countless people who are not true to themselves, are concieded and are quite vexatious...Like Nadia...Not givening out last names or anything(*cough* Sylvestri *cough*) but it wouldnt matter anyway. She moved far far away. After being realized to be the big fake she was. She acted like a know it all to her friends, boys or people she just wanted to show up or impress. Always speaking very properly, which was no big deal..I like people who can say complete sentences but she added such an "Yea I did this, or a, please thats not good enough" twist that it was very obnoxious. She was mean and mannipulative. Im not exagerating either. She truly was. Holden, when describing the phonies he deals with on a day to day basis is quite thorough. He says how Sally, a girl he is acquinted with, always acts like she knows everyone, or has to. And the way Holden describes her friend, the Ivy League College kid is funny as well. He says "He's the kind of person that when answers a question needs to step back to have space." And gos on to say that the man speaks with such a proper tone and puts an exageration on everything. Holdens defintion of a phony is quite similiar to mine... maybe to yours too :)
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