I’ll answer delicately to avoid being called a hypocrite. I’ve always enjoyed this archetype. I never minded sharing a name with The OC’s sometimes anorexic, somewhat bipolar, occasionally overdosing Marissa Cooper. And I’d be lying if I said no student has ever caught me perusing the wikiHow for how to be more like John Green’s Alaska Young.
So I guess I’d have to say that, yes. I do enjoy the kind of girl that has some issues but is also stupid-hot. Though overdone, it can still be an interesting character with depth. I can dig it.
The femme fatale is hot.
But the femme flacide, as I would like to dub a recurring type of character in recent twangy pop music, is NOT.
The femme fatale is the girl you’re with when you drink a 40 and a 5-hour Energy on your way to go do something awesome that will probably get you arrested.
The feme flacide is the wholly unattractive girl crying on the floor of your dorm room because she’s just professed her love to you and you told her you’d rather just be friends (at least until she does something about that moustache). You think to yourself: I really should go to Spanish class, but does 90 minutes give this bitch enough time to consume my athlete roommate’s entire supply of painkillers and Joose? Ain’t nobody got time for that!
I don’t have time for it, anyway. But the crappy folk-pop currently littering the Top 40 radio waves does.
We first see the feme flacide in One Direction’s second single about a girl with low self-esteem (not to be confused with their first single about a girl with low self-esteem). The music is toned down, the boy-band sound is subdued; this is their serious song, guys!
And since the average One Direction fan lacks the higher-order thinking skills to make an inference, they are easy on the subtlety when crooning about this down-on-herself female:
“You never want to know how much you weigh/ You have to squeeze into your jeans/ But you’re perfect to me.”
The song is aptly named “Little Things,” and I’m just going out on a limb here, but I’m guessing that the perfectly perfect little Brit tweens of 1D are not actually chubby chasers. Nope. Instead, they are fetishizing the already way too common complaining of size 0 preteens: “I’m fat.” Sorry Liam, Niall, and whatever other terribly named little shits are in that group. There is only one song worth listening to about low self-esteem.
Phillip Phillips, the American Idol winner whose music is as redundant as his name, recently created that song on the radio that you probably think is just Mumford and Sons’ weakest single. It’s called “Home.” Hm. I’ve never heard a song by that title before.
Phillip X 2 would like to tranquilize his love interest: “Settle down, it’ll all be clear/ Don’t pay no mind to the demons/ They fill you with fear.”
More often than not “demons” are a euphemism for “deal-breaker.” Like when your girlfriend is a perfect 10, except for the whole “dissociative identity disorder” thing. And the whole “sociopathic” thing. These are just words. Words are just demons.
The girl from Ed Sheeran’s (by the way, what the fuck kind of stage name is that? That sounds like the name of my mom’s friend’s husband, not a pop star) latest single has got some real problems. I mean, she’s got girl-from-Bright-Eyes-lyrics level of issues.
She’s apparently a prostitute. Has been since age 18. “But lately,” Ed sighs, “her face seems/ Slowly sinking, wasting/ Crumbling like pastries/ And they scream/ The worst things in life come free to us/ Cause we’re just under the upper hand/ And go mad for a couple grams.”
Is this really the girl you are pining after, Mr. Sheeran? That’s okay and all, but I would advise you to look for track marks while holding her hand...and maybe request an HIV screening before taking things to the next level.
I think what I hate the most about this song is the way he says the word “pastries.” From the Toaster Strudel to anything and everything Entenmann's--the pastry is a sacred thing to me. Don’t taint it with your overdone accent and put-on quaver! Just don’t!
Ed Sheeran goes on to sulk through cliche metaphors: “It’s too cold outside/ For angels to fly.” I’m not quite sure what exactly happens when it’s too cold outside for angels to fly. I’m much more acquainted with what happens when angels deserve to die...and it’s awesome.
So all in all, I’m just tired and bored of hearing about this kind of passive, hopeless headcase of a girl. I’d like pop music, especially this bizarre subset of folk pop to dig a little deeper, please. Throw in a new archetype. What about a down-ass bitch? Maybe a folk cover of “Bonnie and Clyde 03”? It is about time for the femme flacide find an extremely pathetic and cowardly way to do what she was always destined to do.
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