#should i go ahead and promote smiling friends to special interest status???

[melis-hellis]

ok but what's crazy is that for a couple months before s2e7, i had an idea for an emotional scene in a fic where charlie has to give pim CPR. zach and michael i see y'all!!!!!!!!

[popanalysis99]

The Cool Girl Trope: Explained

“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.“ - Gillian Flynn, Gone Girl.

The trope “cool girl” is defined as a girl who is “one of the guys” and likes what men like, eg. sports, video games, junk food, swearing, cheap beers etc. basically she is a “dude in a gorgeous woman’s body”.  This term was first coined in the novel Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn which was later deconstructed and called out.

The problem with the Cool Girl trope is that it’s just a male fantasy. Meaning that it’s an idea that is invented by men. Basically they not only have to act but reinvent themselves into what men want them to be: A Cool Girl. Gone Girl explores this fallout and how this took a huge toll on Amy, when she tried to pretend to be something for Nick when she first met him, but when she grew tired of it and he began to cheat on her, this caused her to lose it and go on a rampage where she would frame her husband for her murder. It basically shows that if a cool girl grows tired of putting up with the act and stands up for herself and shows her own agency, then the man will grow tired of her and move onto someone else. 

Examples of Cool Girl in Media

There are many examples of Cool Girl all over movies and tv shows:

The most popular one and one of Flynn’s inspirations for Gone Girl is Mary from There’s Something About Mary portrayed by Cameron Diaz. Mary is a girl who is a doctor, but is shown to have an interest in golf and other sports and loves hamburgers. Another peculiar thing is that throughout the movie is that a lot of a guys...a LOT...fall head over heels for her and begin to stalk her and there isn’t even a reason why.

Donna Pinciotti from That 70′s show is defined as a tomboy who is a feminist and loves to hang out with the guys down in her boyfriend Eric’s basement. She is shown to play sports and loves to wrestle for fun with Eric and is unapologetically feminist.

In How I Met Your Mother, when Ted first meets Robin, he describes her as the perfect girl. Robin is shown as someone who loves scotch, sports and doesn’t want anything serious. It’s also justified since she was also brought up as a tomboy by her father in Canada.

The Cool Girl Vs. The Girl who Cares a lot

Just like the video above by the Take describes, the Cool Girl is often compared with a girl who is “uptight, feminine or cares too much.” there are many examples of this comparisons. Either in the same media or in two different medias.

For example in Black Swan, when the repressed good girl Nina is compared with fun loving Lily by her dance instructor, she feels like her struggles of becoming her dancer is for nothing.

Using the examples of two female detectives from two different tv series, Kensi Blye from NCIS: Los Angeles and Domnique Dipierro from Mr. Robot, who represent the Cool Girl vs. the girl who cares a lot argument.

In Dom’s case, she is an FBI agent who is assigned to solve the 5/9 case. We see that she is a lonely workaholic woman who is determined in solving the 5/9 case. She usually chats with Alexa and jerks off to sex room chats. She cares too much about her work and finding someone but she fails to when she ran off from a proposal due to her social anxiety. All she believes in is getting the work done but unfortunately loses her own identity in the process. She even mentions how she has no life outside of her work. When she gets put through so much trauma, including being forced into working for the Dark Army, she easily breaks down and becomes a fearful doormat for them, which causes her to completely lose her own agency. Dom basically represents the “girl who cares a lot.”

While Kensi in NCIS: Los Angeles, who is a NCIS Special Agent is shown to subvert these kind of narrative. She isn’t a workaholic or anti-social because of it. She isn’t obsessed or determined with solving a case or finding clues to something or being promoted to a higher status or have a need to prove herself, she is just cool and humble with the way she is. She enjoys the company of her male friends and isn’t afraid to try out new things. She even shows that she can be assertive and manipulative for survival and use her street-smart skills and wits and she can have more feminine aspirations such as settling down and being a mother without being ridiculed or dehumanized for it. And whenever she is put through any trauma, she is able to stand back up and keep going. Kensi shows that being herself is what makes her cool.

Conclusion

The true meaning of Cool Girl should be that we shouldn’t be act “cool” just to be with a man. Being a cool girl means to be our true selves and find our identity and we can gorge on junk food and enjoy manly interests without impressing them.