Unfortunately, some of these young people seek to express their own sense of worth be denigrating that of others. T.J. is a young man already angry at life for his lot, and he expresses his sense of worth by seeking revenge for the way another member of the swim tam has treated a brain-damaged student. T.J. himself is both black and Japanese and has experienced prejudice himself. He sees the brain-damaged student as another person suffering because of prejudice, though his need for revenge is for himself as much as for this student.

Students can relate to these characters and to the situation, similar to their own roles in life and to behaviors they have seen in their own world. The story shows several characters facing the same sorts of dilemmas and testing different responses, and this can be used to enlist suggestions by the class about the nature of...
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