33 Stories Of The Most Popular Kid In School Becoming A Social Pariah Overnight That Honestly Mostly Made Me Go "Justice Was Served"
Recently, we wrote about how people went from super popular to broadly hated in their school overnight, and members of the BuzzFeed Community submitted their own stories. Here are 33 more popular kids who lost their status in the blink of an eye.
We also included some answers from the original Reddit thread.
NOTE: There are mentions of child sex abuse, sexual assault, manslaughter, and suicide.
1."In seventh grade, the popular girl — let's call her Jane — had everyone's Snapchat. Now, I didn't have Snapchat, but I got screenshots from a friend showing that Jane had made multiple posts using the n-word (she was white). The screenshots quickly spread all around the school. Then, she threatened to bring a gun and shoot the person who originally shared the photo. Everyone was chatting about it all weekend, and by Monday, her popularity had DROPPED. She went from queen bee to that one kid everyone hates for a good reason."
—Anoymous
2."This group was at the top of the social food chain — they had looks and popularity and were wildly confident. My family and I were neighbors with a couple of them. When we went on vacation, the group broke into my house and had themselves quite a party. They slept in all our beds, ate and drank my parents' food and liquor, and even stole my piggy bank money and my bicycle. It really shook my family up. The police got one to rat out the others. That changed all of them from heroes to zeros. They weren't so cocky anymore, and the rumors were even bigger than what had happened. Decades later, I still hear people gossiping about them from the school days."
—Anonymous
3."Not his fault, but his dad (investor) stole millions from his customers, and before he was caught, he wired all the money to his wife, and they got a divorce. The kid stopped coming to school out of embarrassment as his mom continued to live the high life with the stolen riches. His dad ran away to another un-extraditable country and was constantly on the front page of the news."
4."He decided to head down to the local BLM protest and screamed racial slurs and threats to the people from his Jeep. He thought no one would recognize him, but because of the face masks, he didn't realize he screamed it right in the face of one of his best friends from high school. They got it on recording, and both his parents lost their jobs. Also, there was a crowd surrounding his house, waiting for him to come outside. The whole town went from thinking he was so funny and sweet to literally shunning his entire bloodline."
5."One of the most popular boys in school went from a football hero to a social zero overnight. He drove drunk and hit a family with his dad's car. The mom and two youngest kids were killed instantly. A five-year-old daughter was paralyzed. The dad was physically okay, but his family and life were ruined. The popular kid showed up Monday, acting like nothing happened. Everyone knew what he'd done, and no one would talk to him. He went to juvie soon after, and no one ever saw him at school again."
—Anonymous
6."This is the fastest I've ever seen someone fuck up their life. There was a kid a grade below me who was a basketball star and was extremely popular. All the girls at school wanted to date him, but he was always too focused on athletics to date. Senior year, he got in a bad car accident. He was drunk driving and crashed. He crushed his leg and could hardly walk again, much less play basketball. He was charged in the death of the passenger, who was an 11-year-old girl from another town. But when police were investigating why she was in the car, they found that he'd raped like five girls between the ages of eight and 13."
7."A guy airdropped a nude pic of his girlfriend to the whole cafeteria during lunch. Some of the teachers got it, too, and his girlfriend dumped him and turned the school against him. There are over 3500 students at my school. Everyone saw her picture."
8."A member of the football team raped his best friend's girlfriend at a party but convinced her that she was with her boyfriend. I don't remember the exact situation, but I guess he was accused by a few women and traumatized a bunch of students at the school — one, I think, killed themselves. (I switched schools for unrelated reasons, so a lot was secondhand for me.) He ended up going to the private school nearby, but word traveled pretty fast, and his life was hell there. A few months later, another one of his friends, I guess, beat him to a pulp for hitting on his sister — he died of his injuries."
9."I went to school in a rural area. A guy a year older than me shot himself in the stomach and told everyone that someone had broken into his house and was trying to get his sister. He said he was trying to protect her and got shot in the process. He missed like half of the school year and had to repeat his sophomore year. Another kid in our school got a hold of the police report, which basically proved he shot himself. His parents refused to move, and he had to finish high school with no friends."
—Anonymous
10."One of my classmate's little brothers ended up getting the whole damn school hating him overnight. He was an insufferable jackass to begin with. One night, he and two other kids decided to go for a joyride in his mom's convertible. He was 15 with no license. They were going down the highway, and he was speeding, going 80 mph in a 60 mph zone. They told him to turn around and take them home because he was being an asshole. Well, at the off-ramp of the highway, he thought he'd scare them by swerving left and right but ended up skidding off the shoulder and flipping the car. One of the kids was essentially shredded from being dragged between the trunk and the pavement. The guy who was killed was one of the sweetest, funniest, and outgoing kids in the world. The driver thought he'd get sympathy, but all he got was our whole high school turning their backs on him."
11."A popular guy in my year pissed himself during an exam in our gym hall — unfortunately for him, the biggest asshole in our year was sitting directly behind him. He immediately stood up and yelled, 'P****** pissed himself!!' He proceeded to get teary-eyed and say, "It's my energy drink; it spilled," over and over before the exam supervisor literally dragged him out of the hall. Two weeks later, he returned to school as an unpopular kid and kept a low profile for a while until it eventually died down. He then climbed the social ranks once more...that is, until an episode of The Inbetweeners (a popular TV show in the UK) aired in which one of the main characters shits himself in the exam hall, and it reminded everyone of what happened, effectively nuking his popularity all over again."
12."This really popular football player had some beef with another dude at school. The other dude had been talking smack. The football player confronted him in the parking lot. The kid insulted him and got in his truck. The football player punched through the window and dragged the guy out the window while his truck rolled into another car. The football player beat the guy so bad he went to the hospital. The football player tested positive for steroids and apparently was roid raged out of his mind. The popular football player dude was instantly friendless, kicked out of school, and charged with crimes. I don't even bother telling the story anymore because no one believes it. It was that absurd."
13."I went to an all-boys high school. In junior year, the most popular kid (nicest guy, never had a bad thing to say, varsity athlete, d1 scholarship shoo-in) got caught taking upskirt photos of the female teachers. He had been doing this for years for personal use. No one expected it, and it sent a bombshell through the school. Multiple female teachers broke down in class because they couldn't believe a kid they respected would do something like that to them. He was expelled, but as far as I can remember, charges weren't pressed. He still went to a respectable college. It was pretty fucked up."
14."He started a rumor that a girl had given him a handjob during one of those 'free days' where the teacher turns off the lights and just puts on a movie. It exploded in a big way, and the girl's foster parents (who were awful in their own right) decided they didn't want to live with a 'slut,' and they kicked her out, effectively ruining her life for a long time over nothing (she's in a better happier situation now thankfully). No one trusted him after that."
"Another guy thought it would be hilarious to stand on the stage and scream 'go back to Africa' on MLK Day, and he immediately got his ass beat by about 20 other kids. Within a week had to transfer schools because he kept getting the shit kicked out of him (and everyone made sure to spread information to that new school too, so he still wasn't safe). He was homeschooled for the rest of seventh grade until senior year."
15."This really popular and nice choir and theater guy was a year older than me in high school. Everyone loved him, and he was just genuinely such a good guy. He helped organize fundraisers for charity and never had a mean thing to say about anyone. His dad was a Spanish teacher at the school, and it came out his dad had been fucking like three of his students (youngest one was 14, oldest 17). The teacher got fired and divorced (he married the 17-year-old once she turned 18, by the way). His son basically disappeared from the face of the earth. He had no social media presence and cut off all his close friends who still wanted to be there for him."
16."This kid who was two years older than me (around 16-17) ... was a very respected person. He was liked by teachers and students. His popularity stopped when the school found he beat the shit out of his girlfriend, almost killing her. He was later expelled."
17."He found out that he could crawl through the ceiling tiles in the guy's bathroom to the girls and took pictures of the cheerleaders as they changed. Nothing happened to him because his dad was the sheriff, but everyone hated him from that day on."
18."His equally popular girlfriend broke up with him, so he slashed her tires and filled her gas tank up with Coca-Cola while it was on campus. His parents sent him to a horse ranch. You literally couldn't make this up."
19."A huge group of popular kids decided to vandalize the school less than a month before their graduation. They snuck into the school at night drunk and used the fire extinguishers as well as ketchup, mustard, and other condiments to obliterate the hallways. To top it off, they drew a swastika on garbage cans outside the school. Some of them didn't graduate for this; they became a huge joke and embarrassment for the town in general. They were caught by checking WiFi logs. When they arrived on the school grounds, their phones automatically connected to the WiFi."
20."She and all of her 'popular' friends made a shared Twitter where they made awful jokes about Black people, Asian people, disabled people, etc. They used the the n-word and the r-word a lot and made fun of the really sweet students with disabilities at school. One of the girls who was part of the account turned them all in. They all switched to online school, and one of them lost her full-ride scholarship to play soccer for Michigan State because the news spread that far. Just because you're popular and have a big ego doesn't mean you can get away with being the worst. ¯_(ツ)_/¯"
21."He posted a video of himself high as a kite, rapping to a song while he had a pistol pointed to his dog."
22."In high school, this popular girl was adored by students and staff. She was very charming. She was most popular with the guys; she'd sleep with them and then dump them. The guys all knew they were just conquests, but they didn't care. That was until Mike (not his real name) got asked out. Mike dressed like a punk, but he was genuinely a very sweet guy. Mike took her out on real dates. No sex. After a few dates, Mike broke things off. That did NOT go over well. Some pretty vulgar graffiti about Mike started appearing in the girl's bathrooms. It only took a few days for it to come out that the popular girl was the one writing the graffiti."
"That destroyed her reputation with the teachers. Then, it came out that Mike dumped her because she was pressuring him for sex. Yeah. Her popularity was over."
23."Her dad owned the most popular bar/food place in my city, and then there was a massive E.coli breakout, and it actually was a very serious health issue. (People were having to line up outside the hospital to get some shot? I don't know, this was fourth grade.) She became a pariah; the whole family really suffered for a while because of that."
24."He was a popular kid until he ... started sending videos of him jerking off to many of the girls in school. The first few people were just like, 'wtf,' but after everyone figured out he was doing this to like 10-15 girls all at once, they practically exiled him."
"His mom was very, very religious, and she did not approve of his decisions and made it very known that he was going to be grounded for all of eternity. Everyone knew his mom (she was a coach at the school, helped with picture day, and was all around a lovely and very helpful woman at the school, but she could turn in a second into a very angry mama bear), and no one would touch that kid with a 10-foot pole after that."
25."One of the cool kids I went to high school with lit someone on fire and went to prison. Immediately became uncool."
26."One of the kids at our school lived with his grandma cause his parents died. This dickhead and a group of his mates started harassing the old lady whenever she came to pick him up. The principal reported this, and they ended up getting expelled together."
27."There was a girl who was really popular, and then she got pregnant and had an abortion. One of her shitty friends told other people, and then everyone called her a slut and started rumors saying she got the abortion because the dad could have been one of 10 different guys. It was awful. High school bullying in the 2000s was a mess."
"I felt really bad for her. I regret not doing anything. I didn't at the time because she once threatened to spit on me because I dropped a bottle of grape juice like four feet away from her, and it almost got on her white pants (2000s style). But regardless, she didn't deserve that; no one does."
28."There was this bully at one of my old schools. I'm not sure if he counted as 'popular' so much, but his parents were rich and had connections to the teachers, so he was definitely considered untouchable. Until one day when he kicked a fellow student in the groin so hard he needed a colostomy bag for a month. After that, people would punch the bully in the dick whenever he walked by. I considered it pretty much student justice."
29."Our high school president at the annual Grade 12 male variety show. It's pretty much a Miss America Pageant for senior men to put on a show for the school/community for some laughs and raise money. He came out on stage wearing nothing but a diaper and dancing to 'Sexy Back.' I think he thought its absurdity and shock factor would make it the most hilarious thing anyone's ever seen, but all he got was a couple of nervous laughs and groans. Suddenly, the lights go out, his music gets cut, and he gets dragged off stage by the teacher organizing the event. Nobody knew what was happening at the time."
"Fast forward to the next day at school, he gets stripped of his presidency with about three weeks to go of school, and they have serious chats about canceling the event for good for the upcoming years. My friends and I were all pissed that this one guy almost cost us our chance to participate the next year. People in his grade just shunned him completely."
30."A guy at my school got drunk at a party, got naked and inserted his penis into a Jim Beam bottle, and ran around with it attached but not having to use his hands. At the time, it was quite a laugh, but it wasn't until a day or so later that people thought about how small the opening was to a Jim Beam bottle. That was basically the end of him."
31."When a girl from our school died in a horrible accident, the popular girl said, 'Who cares? She was just a wallflower.' She got a lot of angry responses for that, and no one looked at her the same again."
32."He went to the courtyard at lunch and threw a tin foil/toilet cleaner bomb into a trash can. He was arrested and interrogated by the police. Everyone naturally steered clear of him after finding that out. I was the one who told him about the tin foil thing. Whoops."
33.And finally..."He released ticks into the school cafeteria. He gave several students Lyme disease."
Now it's your turn — what incident in your school made someone's popularity tank (or rise) overnight? Let us know in the comments below or via this anonymous form.
Submissions have been edited for length/clarity.
