College does not rule. You rule. And you don’t need to prove a goddamn thing to anyone.

Stay safe out there, freshmen. The real luck is going home whole. Jason M. Stanton is a former RA and current writer on youth culture and institutional trauma.

When the frat bro yells "College rules!" across the quad, smile politely and keep walking. When someone calls you a "lucky fucking freshman," understand that they are trying to sell you a ticket to a party you don’t want to attend.

If you are over the age of 25, reading that sentence likely triggers a wince—a memory of a hangover, a regretted text message, or a night that ended with you losing a shoe in a bush. But if you are that incoming freshman—the one with the meal plan card still warm from the printer and the XL twin dorm bedding that smells like home—those four words represent the highest possible stakes. They are a promise of transformation. They are a threat of exposure.

And the old guard hates them for it.