You would think that a group of 20-somethings and up who took the LSAT and impressed all the necessary people to get into a post-undergraduate program would be above the cattiness and gossiping of hormone fueled adolescents, but you'd be wrong. In fact the stress and pressure of school mixed with the ability to purchase and consume alcohol any time one wants only worsens the situation by five fold.
Most law schools break their incoming class into sections, the size and number of sections varies by school, I'm sure. At my school there are 4 sections (three full time and one part time/evening) and there were close to 100 people in my section but by finals, my first semester that number had dwindled to just less than 90. You share all your classes with your section. So you quickly become one large dysfunctional family, going to lunch together in between classes, studying together, and only talking to yourselves at school sponsored events (which leads to a lot of intersection drunken hook ups that everyone else hears about).
When you have a fairly large group of people it's can be expected that they will break into smaller groups. For the most part the drama and gossiping is not nearly as malicious as high school, but everybody knows something about everyone else. It's pretty safe to assume if one person in the section knows something it won't be long before the entire section knows. I probably know way more than I should about the sex lives, health issues, background, etc. of my classmates, some of which I haven't spoken more than two words to.
The legal community is small and you do not, 15 years from now, want to be remembered as the one that drank a little too much at the weekly happy hour and made out with a couple of guys AND girls from your section or the one who could not get along with anyone.
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