Recently I have seen some women or people who sort of look like women say that they hate the “good girl” trope. The problem is with its non-specificity. Does “good girl” mean “nice girl”? What about women who are “good”? Is it because “good girls” are boring?
I think it is something about purity culture and the whore/maddona complex but I’m not sure. Do you know?
Ooooh, I haven’t heard about this, but I believe you. Maybe people are getting tired of unhinged women who go nuts and kill people? There have been so many of those kinds of books out lately, so maybe there’s some growing backlash. There’s definitely always been a lingering odor of purity culture hanging over America. *nod nod*
There has to be a balance between Nice Girls and Monster Women. A lot of people are both, and they would make for interesting protagonists.
You mean like a split personality? That would be interesting!
Maybe not so extreme
I’m not really onw to care either way. Just like I like solid male leads, a solid character is nice, too.
I’m at risk of myopic becoming my word of the day. Let’s switxh to limited. The same way that nice guys finish last because they aren’t good men, nice girls have their motives questioned all over the place. This is really heavily addressed in some of the mangas I posted lasy year. The “poor pitiful me” act ticks peiple off.
Unfortunately, most people are stuck in this limbo where they don’t have a good grasp on what strength actually is.
Ill give an example:
What clothing women wear. First off, yes, no clothing is forbidden to anyone. You do have body autonomy.
The problem is that just like women have this list of things they want in a man: and some of that is attiude like “wash a dish, youre not being praised for it”, there is a segment of females that like to dress up for the attitude of I wwnt men to worship me todqy. They aren’t catering to their relationshop they are catering to their ego. Its more disjointed when we see guys body build for that same priase (because women are less inclined to worship muscles than men are inclined to worship clevage, just facts).
So their guy asks them not to dress a certain way, and its WWIII. “The guy is insecure. I’m not one of them flirts!”
Sure, many women are like “Yaaas! Queen! Slaaaay!”
And Im lver here thinking youre Don Quixote, at best.
Its not strength. Getting in a fight over objections to your lifestyle isnt strenght. Its brittle.
But its a step up from just letting everyone push you around, so I can see why there’s delayed development at that stage in the process.
Or maybe a “good” girl who’s actually evil, but committing sins/crimes out of a belief that it’s the right thing to do. For instance, right now I’m reading a book about old Hollywood and the early scandals, and there were lots of church women back then who thought it should be illegal for women to wear makeup or tight skirts because it “encouraged men to be sinful.” Imagine someone like that committing murder in order to compel other women to obey the Bible. 'Cause heaven forbid men should be responsible for their own behavior. Biblical gender roles are an excellent driver of evil! ☜(ˆ▿ˆc)
for me, i dislike the “good girl” archetype because in many iterations, it equates to an insecure and eternally self-sacrificing doormat who willingly takes abuse from her love interest (especially when paired with the “bad boy,” as she often is) who is simultaneously meant to be seen as admirable or as an audience stand-in. i don’t see these traits as admirable, especially for young girls. feels as though it’s reinforcing “he’s mean to you because he likes you” to an older audience which can be even more dangerous. we live in a culture that fetishizes women who become martyrs and often shames women who stand up for themselves.
there is something much more therapeutic as an afab reader in female characters who don’t hold it together and who do snap and strike first.
there are exceptions, of course. for example, in anime, i love tohru handa as a protagonist despite her checking many of these boxes - she is kind, self-sacrificing, and overly modest. ultimately, it comes down to writing quality and personal preference.
This one is always a catch-22 to me . Men need to be better (and so do women) but we go to court all the time because they are not. And its doucmentable that lots of monsters start with images, but most the victims are availability. So that accountability culture is right and wrong at the same time. Visuals do a lot to trigger people, but self control isn’t from your triggers, but from your accountability. When it is taught with just one and not the other, there’s no balance.
And it extends out beyond this subject. I could trigger you with data, set you up to reinforce beliefs that aren’t the whole picture or we could both be accountable and question everything.
And some of it is point blank men in thoae cultures need to quit setting up their deisrss as their enemy and push beyond that. The enemy you set yourself up for is the low threshold you’re going to fail to overcome because youre not shooting for better than it.
she was eaten by the Wattpad Y/N
A month ago I heard a booktuber mention how much she hates the trope.
the wattpad y/n trope? i would too, if i read wattpad fanfiction. but it makes a hilarious satire trope.
Nah, “the good girl”
ah, that one I don’t mind so much. I think it just got overused and also hit that point where a lot of the people putting out new content using it failed to understand it beyond a surface level, so instead of a complex “good” character they ended up with an annoying cardboard caricature.
But what IS a good girl?
¯_(ツ)_/¯ not a trope i’ve used recently, you’ll have to ask google for a good answer.
I just had to ask because it’s been applied to characters like Tessa from After to Tohru from Fruits Basket, ignoring how different those characters really are in practice.
In the case of Tessa and other girls from toxic romances, good girl just means virgin, doesn’t it? Because as we know, only satanists have sex. (>‿◠)
Calling her a character, lol.
She fufills the bare minimum by existing in the story.