Today at an on-campus birthday party, I was overcome by a feeling that I don't understand. I was peacefully eavesdropping on two of my non-guy friends who were attending a party when I was unfortunate enough to hear an extremely unpleasant conversation. I think that I was bothered by the fact that I found this to be a perfectly normal conversation.

The girl's brother found a saved MSN messenger conversation between a guy with us in college and herself. She feels like she's betrayed his trust by speaking to a guy outside the walls of campus, and now she's devastated that he thinks of her in a new light. but here's what I found interesting: She has no problem with the whole thing. I mean, the fact that she actually did talk to him on the internet isn't an issue for her. She just thinks that now he'll never look at her the same way again. In other words, she's not convinced with what she's doing, but she's really just doing it out of fear of being labeled as something she's not.

What made me more certain of that conclusion was that when the girls were picking a place to go have lunch, they joked that we should go with them, but stay a few tables away from them. In other words, they were trying to be sublte about thinking of ways to go out with us. However, the stigma of being seen with members of the opposite sex was too much for them to handle, and the idea was aborted. (Even when we were all on our way to the main road to go home, they sped up ahead of us so as not to be seen with us)

The conclusion I've drawn from these stories is simple. The issue isn't that the girls feel that what they are doing is the right thing, and that to remain respectable within the community they have to do what they do. The only reason they do all that is because they've been fed all of it since they were too yound to remeber, so it really becomes an everyday thing for them. That plus the fact that everyone else thinks in the same way makes them too afraid to defy the norm and be labelled as "free" girls. But what I find most unpleasant is how this way of thinking has found its way into the internet. If they're afraid that their parents would find out about their relationships with guys, then the internet is a safe place for them where the parents can't find them. And if they really want to be safe, then they shouldn't save the online conversations.

But my greatest regret was being forced to pay 30 pounds for a present that was so unbeleivabley ugly. They'd better not get me anything like that on my bithday. :)