Everyone faces varying degrees of peer pressure at least once in their life, but what matters is how you reacts. In Bad Haircut, a collection of short stories, author Tom Perrotta examines the effect of peer pressure on the main character, Buddy, in a light that is both comical and informative. Buddy constantly faces peer pressure and ends up associating with the wrong people, due to a lack of courage. Yet Buddy is different and a better person than those he associates with because he is compassionate and able to recognize that he is a follower; herein lies the irony that only the reader sees Buddy's merit while the other characters only see the results of his friends' poor judgment. Buddy's sense of right and wrong is strong to begin with, thanks to a foundation in the Boy Scouts and idolization of the Wonderful Man Weiner. At age nine, Buddy is a proud member of the Boy Scouts, but his troop is a typical collection of third-grade bullies. While waiting for the Weiner Man, the troupe picks on a mentally challenged boy, but a nerdy member of the troupe protests. His protest is followed by Buddy's request to "leave him alone"; this shocks his troop by intimidating the boy (Perrotta 7). This small act of defending Kazoo shows that Buddy is compassionate and knows right from wrong; but this act is comical and ironic because immediately after his righteous defense, he lets his troop beat up the nerd without saying a word. Thus begins Buddy's first steps toward following the wrong crowd. According to WebMD, children may be naturally blessed with "inner strength" or "resilience" that allows them to appropriately handle "stressful situations" (WebMD). Buddy has this idea of ​​inner strength, but due to his paper...... middle of paper ... character is reflected in his thoughts rather than his actions (or lack thereof). Perrotta takes the ever-prevalent presence of peer pressure and writes about it in a humorous yet heartfelt way, allowing the reader to understand and empathize with Buddy and teenagers as a whole. Strength?" WebMD - Better Information. Better Health. Healthwise, February 10, 2010. Web. January 9, 2011. inner strength>. Heubeck, Elizabeth. “Peer Pressure in Adolescents: Raising a Child Resistant to Peer Pressure. " WebMD - Better Information. Better health. Internet. January 7, 2011. abuse-cough-medicine-9/peer-pressure>. Perrotta, Tom. Bad Haircut: Stories from the '70s. New York, NY: Berkley, 1997. Print.