The Cool Girl

[wasabi_poptart]

“Men always say that as the defining compliment, don’t they? She’s a cool girl. Being the Cool Girl means I am a hot, brilliant, funny woman who adores football, poker, dirty jokes, and burping, who plays video games, drinks cheap beer, loves threesomes and anal sex, and jams hot dogs and hamburgers into her mouth like she’s hosting the world’s biggest culinary gang bang while somehow maintaining a size 2, because Cool Girls are above all hot. Hot and understanding. Cool Girls never get angry; they only smile in a chagrined, loving manner and let their men do whatever they want. Go ahead, shit on me, I don’t mind, I’m the Cool Girl.

Men actually think this girl exists. Maybe they’re fooled because so many women are willing to pretend to be this girl. For a long time Cool Girl offended me. I used to see men – friends, coworkers, strangers – giddy over these awful pretender women, and I’d want to sit these men down and calmly say: You are not dating a woman, you are dating a woman who has watched too many movies written by socially awkward men who’d like to believe that this kind of woman exists and might kiss them. I’d want to grab the poor guy by his lapels or messenger bag and say: The bitch doesn’t really love chili dogs that much – no one loves chili dogs that much! And the Cool Girls are even more pathetic: They’re not even pretending to be the woman they want to be, they’re pretending to be the woman a man wants them to be. Oh, and if you’re not a Cool Girl, I beg you not to believe that your man doesn’t want the Cool Girl. It may be a slightly different version – maybe he’s a vegetarian, so Cool Girl loves seitan and is great with dogs; or maybe he’s a hipster artist, so Cool Girl is a tattooed, bespectacled nerd who loves comics. There are variations to the window dressing, but believe me, he wants Cool Girl, who is basically the girl who likes every fucking thing he likes and doesn’t ever complain. (How do you know you’re not Cool Girl? Because he says things like: “I like strong women.” If he says that to you, he will at some point fuck someone else. Because “I like strong women” is code for “I hate strong women.”)”


― Gillian Flynn, Gone Girl

Comments

[lapinetrose.livejournal.com]

Oh man, I've felt the need? desire? to be The Cool Girl. Never ends well.

[wasabi-poptart.livejournal.com]

I was less obsessed with being the Cool Girl than I was with being the female version of the Cool Guy. Really, not so much better ... because girls who like to date guys tend to prefer them to have a penis, and guys don't like to date girls who enjoy pointing out their inadequacies.

[kitteridge.livejournal.com]

I do love me some Gillian Flynn. That book spoke to me frequently.

[wasabi-poptart.livejournal.com]

I think I need to read it!

[emily-hahn.livejournal.com]

Heh, I just read it and while I agree with that statement in theory (like the guys who want to be somebody who's into the same things they're into & have the exact same opinions), I kinda had a lot of issues with the book. And the character who states that, there's a little more than just the feminist analysis going on there.

[loreofcure.livejournal.com]

Holy shit, yes.

[kazoogrrl.livejournal.com]

I think in a way I was also more into being a female Cool Guy. But then the guys I liked didn't want to date a guy version of them, then wanted to date the Cool Girl or maybe the Manic Pixie Girl.

[barry-king.livejournal.com]

Oh, the cool girl exists. She's our right hand, in fact.

[waywardgaze.livejournal.com]

Because “I like strong women” is code for “I hate strong women.”

Oh dear god so true. Ditto "I'm a feminist," - just add "...so long as I never feel challenged, threatened, or inconvenienced by my female significant other."