Second entry for Fast Girls

The fourth chapter was all about sexual problems in the suburbs and how generalizations about sluts can also be applied in a "safe environment" like the suburbs. The problems began for a woman named Karen when she was in middle school going to spin-the-bottle parties. From there, everything went downhill. When White went with Karen(age 35 now) to visit some childhood sites, Karen mentioned how she got nervous around people she saw on the streets. White wrote, "Her paranoia is contagious; throughout our visit I will watch people watching her, and wonder if they're part of the mob from the past," (83). It would be terrible to have people bully you and not even know where the rumors are coming from and who is spreading them. At-least when you know who is spreading the rumors you can try to confront them about the problem. These rumors start to make the fast girl experience issues with the idea of class. They feel like they do not have any value because of things written on their mailboxes like "Slut" and "White Trash". If that isn't enough, there is so much pressure from boys at school because in some cases, the jocks or kids who you would not normally expect to gang-rape high school peers will get a power trip and commit the unthinkable. There is a "suburban clich'e of safety," (89) that boys break but girls get the most attention from that usually. (I know that boys are sometimes the victims of girls gang-raping, but in the book I am reading, the girls are the targets so that's the opinion I am basing this reflection off).

The fifth chapter talks about family values and home wreckers. A Catholic philosopher quoted in the book that, "Her self disperses at the same rate as her lovers multiply," (98). This is an interesting perspective and ratio to describe something that is such a big part of humanity. There is definitely a double standard in high school and that is also addressed in the book. "Today the modern high school slut still has no remotely comparable male parallel," (98). This is SO true!!! Girls are sluts but if guys get with a lot of girls they are "studs". Why doesn't this change? Honestly, I don't think this ideology ever will change. White then brings up the temptation that people feel when they are married and how a home wrecker is a woman who thinks she can get anyone she wants when in reality she has no one. But, if the world was recreated, the mother still has to be in the picture, and so does the home wrecker. This is for good reason too. The home wrecker is the "Reference point on the map. She is from the wrong side of the tracks and hence indicates the location of the right side of the tracks," (109). Duality. White really has a few nice paragraphs about this because she gives the home wrecker the benefit of the doubt in a way. We NEED her in the world. We need the bad to see the good. I am starting to like this book a lot more!!