An old concept, revamped

This "essay" was originally posted on my Live Journal, 10/10/06. Reposted on Facebook 11/4/2007. I can't help but still feel this way most of the time, so here I am reposting it again.

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So, I've been getting this question from my guy friends for years now: Why do girls always seem to fall for the asshole guys who'll treat them like shit instead of the nice guys who will treat them like royalty?

Well, the answer within closest reach is that a lot of girls/women/those-of-the-feminine-persuasion have self-esteem issues, and thus being treated like royalty makes them uncomfortable.

Personally, I know that when I've been in relationships where guys have "put me on a pedestal," it's made me worry that either they were being dishonest with me, or that I was being dishonest with them. When how you see yourself doesn't match up with how the other person perceives you, it makes you feel like maybe you're acting in ways you normally wouldn't in order to please him. I know for a fact that I've been guilty of that. I've been pedestalized (which was not a word up until this moment) in the past because I was being who my boyfriends wanted me to be, and not who I really was, or am.

On the other hand, what if your perceptions don't match up because he's just telling you what you want to hear instead of what he really thinks? The problem with self-esteem issues is that no matter how much reassurance someone gives you, it's never quite convincing enough. You might trust the other person, but you don't trust yourself to live up to his vision of you, so you assume that no matter what he says to the contrary, you're still inadequate. I still have my self-esteem crises now and then, but the one thing I've really discovered in the past few years is that no one will ever be able to convince me that I'm good enough. I have to convince myself. When you're in a relationship with someone who tells you all the time how great you are, you end up relying on him to estimate your own self-worth, and thus, you never build up your own self-confidence.

Okay. So now I've discussed why being treated like royalty, or put on a pedestal, or (to not use a metaphor or simile) being held in high regard makes some women feel uncomfortable. But why would a woman want to be treated like shit instead?

To be quite frank, some of us are just masochists. I'll admit it. There are a lot of women who won't. Shit happens. But, I also think there's more to it than that. For women with low self-esteem, being treated badly by the men they're with reinforces how they already see themselves, and in a sick and twisted way, builds their self confidence because they can say, "Well, at least I'm right about how much I suck." It's nice to be right about something when you feel like everything about yourself is horribly, horribly wrong.

For the confident women out there, though, maybe it's nice to be taken down a peg every once in a while? It's probably also refreshing to be challenged on occasion. Chances are, if you're confident, you're more likely to stand up for yourself when someone treats you badly, and maybe there's something attractive about the thrill of defending yourself. [That's just a guess, though. I wouldn't know, but I have a feeling most confident women wouldn't stay in relationships where their partners don't respect them.] If there are any really confident women out there who would like to add to that thought, by all means... [I've been waiting for someone to answer that call since I first posted this in 2006.]

Now that I've shared my thoughts about the downside of being treated well, and the upside of being treated badly, what in the bloody hell led me to write this cheerful little journal entry? I shall tell you.

Some men are assholes. Some are very nice. Some men obviously fall in between the two extremes. That should cover everyone, right? WRONG. This has dawned on me before, but someone reminded me to think about it again today. To begin with, I've decided that for myself, the men who fall in between the "asshole" and "nice guy" polarities are most likely to be friends. This leaves me with two options regarding the men I can date, right? WRONG!!! It leaves me with four:

1) Men who are assholes.
Bastards, plain and simple. They care only about themselves, and will trample anyone else in order to serve their own selfish needs. We've all known a guy like this at some point in our lives. He's the guy who drives by your apartment at 2am honking and screaming at the one and only pedestrian to "get the fucking hell out of the fucking road" because he wants to turn right on red. [The thought being: if he's an asshole in his everyday life, why would he behave any differently in a relationship? The world revolves around him and no one else really matters -- especially not you.]

The upside is... um... he'll treat you like shit if you want him to, and even if you don't. No questions asked.

2) Men who are, on the surface, assholes, but who eventually turn out to be a whole lot nicer than you ever would have thought.

These are the assholes women fall for - the James Deans, the Danny Zukos... the bad boys, with hearts of gold. They'll charm you, win you over, and then they'll break your heart. They'll cheat on you, or leave you for other women, or tell you they were never yours in the first place. They won't tell you how pretty you are. They won't buy you flowers, or gifts, or remember things like when your birthday is, or how long you've known each other, or what your friends' names are. They might not even remember what you're studying at university. They might even disappear and not contact you for days, weeks, or even months. But you'll love them with all your heart, and it'll hurt like hell.

And then, one day, they'll shock the hell out of you. They'll call you out of the blue to tell you that they love you. They'll suddenly impress you with an astonishingly accurate and dreamily reminiscent description of a day that you'd shared together once upon a time, which you had completely forgotten. They'll apologize for hurting you, and they'll actually mean it. [They might even start calling you long-distance every evening -- "just to say goodnight."]

On the other hand, one day, you might decide to leave them. You'll do your best to disappear, and make it very clear to them how serious you are. They'll say things like, "FINE, then," and "To HELL with YOU." A couple weeks will go by, and then they'll suddenly have left you a message on your answering machine saying, "You mean so much to me. I don't want to lose you. Please call me... "

These are the moments for which we live. It's not a power trip, I swear. It's just that it's comforting and fulfilling to find out that these people who seem so tough and indestructible can be brought down by love -- especially when they can be brought down only by your love.

3) Nice guys.
They wouldn't ever do anything to hurt you, and if they somehow unintentionally do hurt you, they will apologize profusely and cry about it and whine about how they "didn't mean to" and ask you to "please forgive" them. They might also tell you how much you mean to them, and confess that they're afraid of losing you. Eventually, you will walk out of the room, saying, "I just need to go be alone and think for a little while," and they'll scream after you, "Please don't leave me! I'm so scared! What if you don't come back?! I'm not sure I can live without you!" The real question is what a nice guy can possibly do to hurt you, the answer to which is that he can make you feel crowded and overly essential to his existence, and just pretty much annoy the hell out of you. I'd venture to say that 9 times out of 10, the nice guy gets dumped because of how nice he is. [See also: "needy," "boring," and "overly sentimental."]

There's a upside, though. The nice guy will treat you like a princess. He'll be loving and devoted, and he'll buy you your favorite flowers and remember your birthday, and quite possibly also your anniversary. He'd never be unfaithful, and most likely, he won't break up with you out of the blue. So, you know, if that's what you're into, go for the nice guy.

[Addendum: Since I first wrote this, people have occasionally pointed out to me that "nice" does not necessarily equal "smothering." This may very well be true. But I write based on my own experience, and in my own experience I have never dated a truly "nice," decent, caring guy who wasn't also totally obnoxiously clingy. So while they may exist (and I really hope they do), I've never had the pleasure of dating any of them. That's also not to say that my friends aren't decent guys -- I know they are. But I'm not dating any of them, am I?]

4) Men who come off as being "nice guys," who turn out to be assholes in disguise.
These people are the absolute worst.

4a) Sometimes they're aware that they're assholes pretending to be nice guys. A man like this is the definition of "a wolf in sheep's clothing." These men are dishonest, conniving, and they'll get what they want from you by deceiving you into thinking that they'd never hurt you. They act like nice guys, and think like assholes. They'll convince you they're in love with you, and you'll fall in love with them. They'll buy you gifts, and flowers, and remember all the important things PLUS all the unimportant things. These boys have done their homework. They'll supposedly leave other women for you, and they'll talk a lot of nonsense about spending your lives together, getting married, having children [blah blah blah], etc. Then, they'll suddenly disappear. You won't see them. You won't hear from them. When you finally do reach them, they'll either tell that you they're leaving you for someone else, or start a fight with you about how you've drifted apart and it's all your fault. Possibly, they'll do both. Either way, they will compile for you a complete list of everything they think is wrong with you, and everything you've done to hurt them. You will suddenly realize how horribly astray you've been led and will call them on it, and they will (of course) deny everything and call you "paranoid." You'll go back and forth defending yourselves and offending each other until you finally give in and let them have the last word because it's just easier that way. You'll never speak to them again.

4b) The worst kind of all, though, are the "nice guys" who turn out to be assholes, and have NO idea that they're really assholes. They do all the same things as the aforementioned wolves, but they actually truly believe that they're sheep. They'll break up with you unexpectedly and give you a whole list of bullshit reasons why, but they'll actually believe that they're being honest with you. At least a wolf in sheep's clothing knows he's a wolf. These guys just have some sort of collective identity complex [see also: "delusional"]. [Nota bene: Much like generic asshole #1, assholes of varieties 4a and 4b think everything is about them, whether or not they realize they think so -- i.e. "an asshole is an asshole is an asshole."]

I've just realized that I don't seem to have a conclusion for this... erm... essay. In typical fashion, I didn't mean it to end up being this long. I guess this is just my own personal long-overdue response to an age-old question. I think what I really wanted to say was that it's not necessarily as simple as "girls always fall for the assholes and leave the nice guys in the lurch," because it's not just a matter of the two extremes. It really all depends on what floats your boat. So there you go, boyses -- you know who you are. I hope that this might be in some way helpful to you in your relationship quests [or at least perhaps serve as a darkly humorous summary of my own exploits].

I have some (obvious) personal bias because of my own relationship history. Perhaps another woman would say differently than I have, and if so, I hope that she does. I guess what it really all comes down to is that this has been the public justification of my own personal habit of falling for the asshole guys and breaking up with the nice ones. When presented with all the options, guy #2 doesn't seem so bad, right? Right?