“Good Girls Gone Bad” Syndrome
November 29th, 2009 | by Gwytherinn |She used to be the sweetest girl ever
Now she like sour amoretta
She used to run track back in high school
Now she tricks off the track right by school- The Sweetest Girl – Wyclef Jean featuring Akon
I make them good girls go bad
I make them good girls go
Good girls go bad- (I Make) Good Girls Go Bad – Cobra Starship
Lights is blinding,
girls need blinders
so they can step out of bounds quick,
the side lines is blind with casualties,
who sip the lite casually, then gradually become worse,
don’t bite the apple Eve,
caught up in the in crowd,
now you’re in-style,
and in the winter gets cold en vogue with your skin out,
the city of sin is a pity on a whim.
good girls gone bad, the city’s filled with them,
Mommy took a bus trip and now she got her bust out,
everybody ride her, just like a bus route- Empire State of Mind – Jay Z
Yes, I love pop music. Having been a dancer for a number of years, anything that makes me want to move is labeled good in my book. Now that I have that admission out of the way, my love of pop music results in encountering a stratosphere of jaw dropping messages that pop culture continuously pushes. One theme which has made me particularly chagrined over time is the “good girls gone bad” theme.
This theme is one of those that makes me grit my teeth more than others. Finally upon downloading Jay-Z’s Empire State of Mind and discovering it was retread yet again (The Sweetest Girl had me yelling at the radio for awhile.) I sort of boiled over. This ridiculously pervasive attitude springs in part from the idea that men have a biological need for sex and must do what they can to procure it while women are supposed to withhold, do not need sex and should not want it. That the “promiscuous” woman, or the stripper and prostitute are “good girls gone bad” is a double standard that serves to prevent men from being held accountable for what we are all supposed to believe is just business as usual, aka “biologically sanctioned” degradation.
In the same way that the actions of abusers and rapists are erased through the language we use and the victim subsequently gets blamed, the same occurs with this “good girls gone bad” meme. While the “fall” of a woman in particular ways is an event to pay attention to and police, that a man is never held accountable for his side of the equation creates a continuum of behavior that is at best tolerated and at worst encouraged. It’s the promiscuous woman, or the stripper and the prostitute who cause the blemish on society rather than the man that creates the demand. (I’ll hold off on the crazy concept that women also want and like sex for another day.) Same justification Islamic fundamentalists use for the Burqa. We’ve even gone so far as to label places where men traffic in women “gentleman’s clubs” – business as usual when a gentleman participates in le doux commerce – women are just something else to be bought and sold.
Oh, but hey, silly me…. how could I forget that a man’s role isn’t completely erased in this equation……. Life for a pimp is tough! (Life Out There is Hard for a Pimp – Three Six Mafia)
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Tags: Feminism, good girls gone bad, human rights, Misogyny, patriarchy, Politics, sexism
By rangerbug on Nov 29, 2009
“I make the good girls go bad.” Really? This is why I never listen to that music. A good beat doesn’t cover up the hateful misogyny.
And what exactly is a “good girl?” That should be your next blog! It would be a long one… Men seek out the “bad girls,” for fun and entertainment. But when it’s time to get serious, it’s all about the good girls… Life is hard for a pimp, indeed. It’s so hard to find a good girl to corrupt.
I was talking to a young man recently, who was raised and schooled in his Christian faith. He said at one point, “I mean, I’m not perfect….” How do I translate that? Does “perfect” equal “virgin” in that world? Do even men feel shame about it? What the hell? Is it worth mentioning that the first Christians made absolutely no mention of “purity,” because they really believed the world was about to end, and hey, let’s party…? Two thousand years later, people are tripping over each other (not to mention our current crusades in the Middle East, and the regular shaming and beating of whatever sexual deviant crosses their path) trying to obey of “the word of God.” The word of god has never existed. It has always been the word of man. MEN. Amen.
By todd on Jan 1, 2010
I always despised Grease for that same concept- the good girl only gets the guy when she turns bad. Well, that and I really hated the music as well. But in all fairness to my gender, that film also brings up another stereotype which often rings true – the good girl who goes for the bad boy. One thing I’ve despised about living in New York is the way a large part of the population tries to fit within set stereotypes – be it the cast of Sex and the City (usually women) or Seinfeld (men). Believe it or not, in the midwest, where I come from, at least the people my age and younger don’t usually feel that women fit into the stereotypes you describe. Granted, there’s a portion of the population that does, and they are a very vocal part of the population, and the media and Hollywood loves to play up that side. But when you go beyond films like Bachelor Party and the Hangover, and salacious headlines, you find that most people accept each other for the way that they really are.
By Gwytherinn on Jan 2, 2010
Hey, thanks for your thoughts, especially concerning the Midwest. I often wish I could have more time to explore the US and get to know people from different regions on a level beyond media hype.
I’ve also definitely done a lot of thinking about the psychology of the “bad boy” dynamic and how this might fit in my life. It’s frustrating!!!