We are incessantly bombarded by the unbreakable dichotomy of whether or not we are “good girls” or “bad girls”. We all know exactly who we think are the good and bad girls, but are rarely capable of explaining why. It would likely be an unfortunate revelation of our inner thoughts to describe our weakest biases. Whether male or female, we hesitate to admit why and how we think about women the way we do. Of course, biases are demonstrated in a number of ways and are directed at an endless supply of individuals, but this being a uterus-oriented post, we’ll stick to female judgement, and more specifically, the prolific “Madonna/Whore” complex…

I have always been a good girl. I never rebelled, really, and spent most of my high school days with my nose stuffed into an orchestra folder. The problem with that, though, is that I really, really wanted to. I spent my time with the kids who smoked too much pot, and who would drink too much and then drive across town to a show they snuck into. They usually avoided school, but when they did attend, excelled. I thought they were a bunch of self- righteous, reckless assholes, and I absolutely adored them. We got along alright on good days, but I undeniably left their presence feeling that I fulfilled the “old lady” role and very little else. I envied their carelessness. I desired a kind of validation from these people, while at the same time felt no respect for the other kids at school. They were who I wanted to be. It was a lusting after the fearless denial of tradition, and watching while everyone else shuffled and panicked according to the dictation of predictability. They became my only, and desperate, means of expressing my disdain for the strenuous demands of the strict framework I was a part of. Really, though, at that age, the options are limited to say the least. My renegade fiber, if it can have such a title as that, is less about breaking silly laws, and more an adrenaline-loaded fantasy featuring a rebel army assembled to protect the interest of the (capital p) People, or breaking small children out of a brothel in the depths of a disease-infested city, or driving 120 mph down a dirt road, escaping a ravenous threat-wielding authority.

I knew, at the tender age of 16, that my time to flip off the Man had not yet come. So I made do.

To feed the ever-growing adventure lust, I worked on wooing the epitome of the class badass. He swaggered with more conviction than any boy I had ever seen, and spoke loudly and nonchalantly about all the things I wished I could have done. The selling point, of course, was his respect for a substantial vocabulary, his penchant for a good fight, and his commitment to the cause of the day. In him was the key- I would not be responsible for any of those ridiculous and totally-not-worth-it activities if I could just bag him. His interest in me was enough to send me to the top of the badass list, with no sacrifice of my own, or so I thought. One overlooked question I would realize five years later after lots of sex and very little else, was the status of my good girl title. Had I sacrificed it? I certainly wasn’t acting in accordance with my good girl self-image, and yet in my mind, it remained unblemished, as though at some point I had forgotten to re-evaluate. My whole-hearted good girl qualities (motivation, planning, prioritizing, etc.) had contributed to a bad girl rap, and I was totally unaware. My topping the badass list did not make me feel more hard core. In fact, I was so sidetracked by the acquisition that I lost all concept of the reward. Worse, the people around me started responding to my bad girl ness more than the good girl. Suddenly, I found that I had transformed, under my nose, from the madonna into the whore. There’s nothing like innocence to send us reeling into the unprotected realm of the things we seek to become. I’ve since receded into my madonna costume again, and I find a kind of respect for women who carry around, proudly, their bad girl indicators. Sure, there might be something internally that smacks of the attitude I once touted, but I find a certain comfort in seeming like the sweet one. People don’t challenge that. Bad girls have to defend themselves.