hoW to m A ke e nemies

Arjun Banwait proposes a new kind of networking

is fun without a sniping mechanic, you need some more distant opponents—the kind that you have to pretend to be nice to in front of others because you don’t know them well enough to be on fully-fledged bad terms, but that you’re able to make ‘joking’ insults about in front of as many people as possible. To acquire some of these, go to lectures and lurk next to seats, then lunge for a seat as another tries to sit down, or go to a political society to which you have no allegiance and smile smugly as you correct their inferior economic policy and laugh at their ill-informed views on social issues. If either of these tactics fail, there is also just being a dick when first being introduced to people through your overlapping social circles. Employing the aforementioned ‘joking insult’ tactic before asking their name is a sure-fire way to get someone thinking “What an asshole!”

This type of enemy is hard to acquire and harder still to keep, requiring some good timing and skill to maintain the low-level animosity and petty insults. To keep a healthy toxic relationship, I recommend sending indirect messages; a one-line Snapchat story against a black background ought to keep the fire burning or, if you’re feeling really creative, organise some form of night out with their friends but don’t invite them (the key to this is making sure they know it’s happening).

With close enemies and distant enemies, all that’s really left is the middle ground, so we need to find someone you’ll have semi-regular contact with. For this category of enemy, the optimal choice is a supervisor; all you need do is be inherently awful at their module and then be indignant when they try to help you in supervisions. This strategy has never failed, with accomplished academics somehow not appreciating hostility as they attempt to teach you the topics that they’re world leaders in. Key ways to nurture a bad relationship in this way include: defensively blaming the lecturer; claiming the supervisor is wrong and whipping out a textbook to prove it; and (perhaps the easiest method) consistently handing work in late (or not at all) with no real reason and then turning up late (or not at all) to supervisions.

Being surrounded by enemies, you now have the grounds to exercise your imagination to your heart’s content: you can fill those boring walks to and from the library with vivid daydreams about murders, spend the queue for Sunday brunch thinking about keying that supervisor’s car, and sit in lectures wondering how it would sound if you threw that guy out of the window.

Get i nvoLved

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