英語検定ライティング準１級（第237回）

縦の序列「自信を失わせて支配する話」

中学生になると定期試験が始まる。年に数回ある試験週間では部活が停止する。成績の良し悪しでランク付けがおこなわれる。劣等感に苦しむ生徒もいれば優越感に浸れる生徒もいる。
A routine examination starts when a child enters the junior high school student, and the students cannot do any club activities during the previous week.
Their grades are determined by the tests’ scores, which seems useful when a teacher makes a ranking list and distinguishes superior students from inferior ones.
The former could have sense of superiority, but the latter might have that of inferiority, which is inevitable.

どちらでもない者もいる。スポーツに活路を見出せるものはテストの点数は無視していい。上記のどれにも当てはまらない者は引きこもりでニートの暗い犯罪予備軍になる可能性が高い。
Only a few students feel nothing about their grades because a student with superior motor skills has only to perform his or her athletic ability in the sports’ world.
Also they could ignore the academic figures.
What frightens Japan the most is that students without both academic grades and superior athletic skills are likely to be antisocial or a NEET, who have negative influences on our society because they cannot enter the workforce without paying taxes, an expert says.

競争社会にはランキングがつきものだ。大学もSからFまである。しかし可哀想だとは思わない。劣等感を誤魔化すために国立大学出身者に理不尽な言いがかりをつける者もいるからだ。
A competitive society could be accompanied by the ranking list, there are a small number of prestigious universities and a tremendous number of  bottom-tier counterparts, however, many people of the latter tend to criticize only a few people of the former with something unpersuasive and unreasonable in order to hide their sense of inferiority behind their shoulders, he says.

上を見ればきりがないが底辺とは思いたくない。劣等感は小競り合いを産む。支配する側は楽だ。やるせなさが下に向くからだ。学歴社会は上手く社会を支配するためのシステムなのだ。
When we keep on looking at those who are superior to us, it won’t end, but we couldn’t allow ourselves to exist at the bottom of the ranking list, so that we should be satisfied with what we have and what we are at present.
Our sense of inferiority leads to a little conflict or friction.
In such a situation, those involved in the controllers could protect their current positions because people without any confidences tend to attack those who look more refreshed or entertained, which causes vicious bullies.
An academic background society might be a convenient situation where the administrators, political power, could control ordinary citizens with academic hierarchies.