The image of a girl gone wild is splashed all over late night television commercials and the poster image of a Spring Break Festival.
Not every girl goes as wild as the girls on spring break in Acapulco do.
But a few of us have our stories and the suffer the subsequent guilt trip of a girl gone wild.Young women are indoctrinated to believe that college is the optimal time to sew her wild oats. Teen movies, sitcoms and a host of other media outlets portray college as some hedonistic paradise where there are no rules, no impossibilities and certainly no consequences for ones's actions.
I moved to New York City when I was seventeen. I had no family or friends here. I came from seventeen years of sexual repression, a host of abuses and their after affects. At seventeen, I was the perfect candidate for a girl who could go wild.
I didn't end up on a video, strip for cash, or dance in the nude at a frat party, but I did live up to my college endeavor... which was to have a good time.During freshman year of college, everyone is living on a high. Everyone's happy to be away from home and living amongst peers. The best part of the college experience is being irresponsible, and not frowned upon for it.
The fine print of the girls gone wild promise is that someone people will never outlive your wild days. Some people will always remember you as the girl who was at every party and kissed a few frogs. Even though I'm far from the bundle of hormones, anger, and impulse that I was back in school, I still bump into people who remind me of the "good ole' days." The same ones who were shoving shots down your throat are the ones who now accuse you of being the dormitory lush.
I'm a firm believer in leaving certain things in the past. College students are self-indulgent and unaware. No one should be held accountable for the immature antics that happened back in the dorms.
But women especially are.
I find it frustrating when people insist on bringing up the past. I had a friend who would always bring up parts of my inebriated past and I felt like it was a form of manipulation. Why bring up the days when I was heart broken and self-medicating the best way that I knew how?
Every girl gone wild has a particular pain or emptiness that she's trying her best to fill. Last night, I hung out with a new friend and an old friend. The latter just couldn't resist bringing up a night from 2 years ago where of us drank and cavorted around the New York City streets.
"Like that night with Brenda, when we got a little crazy" he blurted out over champagne. My new friend looked slightly stunned as if she didn't know what to do.
I had to explain to her that nothing sexual happened. We just had drinks, made inappropriate drunks and did what all people in the early 20s do when they don't care about life.His comment wasn't made out of malevolence but it thoroughly annoyed me. The way he made it sound one could think that we reveled in an evening of debauchery. It just wasn't the case.
Yes, I am a girl with a past. Yes, I've made irresponsible decisions. But hasn't everyone?
I'm over that part of my life. I don't regret being me. I just hate that people insist on reminding me of my less than stellar moments.
Why does America love the image of a girl gone wild? Why are women repeatedly reminded of their moral shortcomings when men run around doing the same if not worse? Are/ were you a girl gone wild?
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Comments (41)
I wasn't one...I'm still not one. It's not really in my personality to be let loose like that. The past is the past. Simple as that. It should be forgotten.
"The best part of the college experience is being irresponsible, and not frowned upon for it."
People genuinely believe this, and as a result there is never a shortage of inebriated college girls willing to take their tops off and screw around.
i can relate... had a drink the other night and everyone was wondering how drunk i was -.-
i love girls gone wild
I'm not one of them, however I do believe that whats in the past has shaped you into the wonderful person you are today and that everything has a purpose. *shrug* it's like when people say "you wouldn't have hung out with me back then" - maybe not, but I hang out with you now, and I love you now, and your past is part of that =)
i had a more wild high school, but i can totally relate. people just have a problem changing how they feel about those who they have already categorized. it's a serious human failing.
"Every girl gone wild has a particular pain or emptiness that she's trying her best to fill. "
CITATION NEEDED.
@SuperEvilPopTart64@xanga - I agree, a 'girl gone wild' could simply be liberated, without having any past (or present) pain or emptiness. There is no reason they wouldn't be an irresponsible person either, and actually do care about life, which is why they're having fun with it.
Eh,I've never been, never will be. If a girl chooses to be a "girl gone wild" all the more power to her but, its just not me.
they drink because it makes them feel more like a "mature adult" but the irony is that being drunk causes the person to act like an immature fool. its all fun and games til someone gets accidentally pregnant because they were too drunk to put on a condom, alcohol poisoned and dies(true local news story) because they don't know their limits and give in to peer pressure of downing too many shot glasses, drives drunk and kills everyone in the car or other stupid yet fun things. I don't have a problem with it. their foolishness is morbidly hilarious to me. too bad for them
my friend was one of the "girls gone wild" her freshman year. she slept with some guy and then whined to me about how she likes him but he doesn't care(because she is just an easy lay) to him. I have no sympathy for sluts lol I'm not a prude but I didn't go to drunken parties as I don't drink. I did go to rave clubs and had fun there. I have no guilt trips or regrets.
Thank you so much for writing this post. I completely agree with you. In my effort to act "my age" (after years of being more mature for my age) I finally let loose and acted like other girls I was around did. I drank and I partied more than I should have. I am a completely different person now and it sucks to be reminded of that, almost undermined in a sense. Just because I was trying to delude myself with alcohol and drugs doesn't mean I'm still the same way or that I was stupid at that time, just lost. I think that a lot of girls that choose that kind of lifestyle are lost, following the crowd (like me), or going through issues (like me) or don't have enough of a backbone to say no (also like me). I know that sounds like I'm generalizing a whole lot, but I can't fathom why any self-respecting girl happy with life could want to party every single night, come home and sleep for maybe an hour and then go to work like I used to do. Just my opinion.
I'm glad I didn't live in the dorms during college. Everyone talks about it being about "the college experience," but I just wanted to get my degree and get out. I saved a thousands of dollars that way, too.
Fortunately, the number of times I've been in a situation of being reminded of something was very few, either because I didn't do that much or because my friends are bright enough to realize that it's not okay to bring things up like that.
I definitely went crazy in college. In high school, I was one of the "good" girls, and then when I went to a university, I finally got to be wild. My friends and I legitimately got drunk every night. I even remember sneaking wine into the library for a study session once. I blew part of my tuition money on a Prada bag one semester. We would also make bets over who could make out with the most guys in a single night. My friends had a "penis list" on their wall of all the penises they had seen both semesters of freshman year. We were all searching for something, and luckily, after a year of that, I think we all found it-- and without having to stick our tongues down too many throats. I hate being reminded of these experiences, especially by people who hardly new me during the time and are just attempting to judge. I don't really regret it, but I don't think I'm proud of it either. Luckily, I think for most people it's really just a phase. I wasn't immature as much as growing into myself. Now, I'm in my university's Honor's College AND don't have to worry about having regrets when I'm in my forties.
well in highschool, everything bad i did i have been reminded about.. it sucks
I completely agree with this, except my this was me in highschool, growing up in a small town it's how everyone was, well not everyone. but i'm just glad honestly that i 'got it out the way' and now in college i'm paying attetion and actually learning
I didn't get too crazy my first year of college and now I'm on my third year and I've kept a pretty tame reputation. I'm usually the one offering to be the dd because my friends get wasted when they say they'll dd. I've had a few drunk nights, but they always involved just my girl friends and very very few guys so it never got bad for any of us. We were all just friends so there was no awkward morning wake up ever. I saw a lot of the girls in my dorm area that got crazy though and they had received very sloozy reputations that everyone was aware of.
I attend a community college, live with my family, and have a mature 25 year old boyfriend. I don't have the right environment to be wild. Which is a good thing, I guess.
I definitely did the wild things when I was in college. Luckily it was so long ago that digital cameras, cell phones with cameras and girls gone wild weren't around (ok they started my last year of undergraduate and I was over the party scene by then). If you wanted to bring a video camera, it was going to be larger than most lap-tops now days. I am ancient. I experienced that somewhat at my friends wedding about 12 years ago, but people weren't rude about it and we were all remembering how crazy we were when we were younger. I kind of find that people that like to point fingers at you, have issues within themselves. When I run into them, I point out there flaws, remind them of the things that they did, and tell ask them if they are sure they want to cast the first stone.
I doubt very seriously I would still run into that problem with my old college pals. If I do, I'd just marvel to myself at how the dorm lush grew up but the gossip didn't.
I guess I have an easy way of laughing at my past, there really isn't a need to cover it up. If my friends who don't understand what I've done in the name of fun, then screw them they are probably boring anyways. If you can't have an honest relationship with yourself, your past and everything else then you most likely need to loosen up a little bit.
I disagree that college is a time to be irresponsible. That is what high school is for. College is being PAID FOR, and is a time to figure out what career one wants, and get prepared for it by working hard. People can't fuck up. It is very close to the real world and some (not all) need to get their act together and be mature about being in college.
past is past. no need to bring it up.
"The best part of the college experience is being irresponsible, and not frowned upon for it."
that's why people don't give a fuck, and that's why girls "go wild"
because their shit is being paid for, and they can do whatever the hell they want.
well- sucks for you! suck it up. You did bad shit, and someone is going to bring it up. IT HAPPENS.
IF you don't want someone to bring your "bad" past up, DON'T DO IT.
OR
don't hang around that person that knows all about your past, anymore. problem solved.
otherwise, you might as well forget about it, if someone knows about it, it'll always be there.
Now, I'm not a female. So I don't fall under this group to deeply. But yes, everyone goes through that time (this time for me.) And its a good experience because you really get to cut loose. But the reason why people bring up the past, I think; is to remind you and let others know that there is always more to someone than meets the eye. Just like how I'll never live down one drunken adventure where I skateboarded into the bar, picked out a girl at random, got her a drink, and rode my skateboard out of the bar with her on my back. Nothing happened, I just wanted someone to skateboard with in my drunken state. But its funny. And I'm a very anti-social person, at best. So its very unlike me.
It's things like that, that make people bring up the past. It's a way of warning people about you and hyping you up at the same time. But there are always times where people bring up things they shouldn't or do it in a bad way and at the wrong time. Sadly, thats just the way people are...
I've been a girl gone wild, just in a different manner than one would expect. People will constantly bring it up because they feel like they know who you are, having seen you at that point in life. They think that if they can just grasp that memory and bring it to your attention, you'll be forced to see them as the two of you once were. Bonded by your mistakes.
Everyone will judge you for it because they automatically assume that the person you are now is just an act, you never changed, you lead two lives, and you've just been faking this entire time.When, of course, in reality you're a porn star who drinks herself into oblivion every night. When people find out anyone has a past, they assume that said past made the person who they are today.Meaning that the person hasn't changed a bit. Meaning that to everyone who knows I have a past, does, and will consistently assume that I'm still that Agnostic party girl. I'm just pretending to be someone entirely different.It's just something to gossip about. If there's one girl who is living it up, no one sees it as that, they see it as an out-of control wayward young lady. It makes them feel better about their own lives. Hell, I have a former college professor, who, because I was depressed and continuously intoxicated, believes I just plow into the drugs on a regular basis. And sees my art, my allegiance to theatre as an outlet for a troubled girl who trips out and paints pretty pictures. And there's nothing I can do to change her mind about that.