Jim got up from the table and left his group of visibly less cool friends behind. He carried his tray out of the dining hall and over to the tray-return counter.
Jim tilted his tray down and let his banana peel, spaghetti remnants, and four used napkins all slide off and into the clearly marked “Food” section. He then walked past the “Non Food” bucket and placed his tray and silverware into their appropriate locations and strolled out of the room. Jim could feel the stares of the astonished onlookers at his back, but he never acknowledged them. Plain and simple, Jim just didn’t give a fuck. In fact, to this day, Jim still doesn’t give a fuck. It’s part of his disposition rather than an attitude he happened to adapt that day due to the circumstances. He always doesn’t give a fuck. Why does Jim always not give a fuck? Because. Jim is another misunderstood member of the most rapidly-growing demographic at Princeton: The Princeton Badass.
The Princeton Badass
Who is the Princeton Badass, you ask? What defines him? Come on. You already know who the Princeton Badass is. You’ve seen him around. The Princeton Badass leaves his laundry in the washing machine for a few hours- maybe even a few days. What- he doesn’t give a fuck if you have to use the next washing machine over, or wait for a free one. He’ll move it to the dryer when he fucking gets around to it. And if it’s really a problem for you, you can move it into the dryer for him; you’re his bitch. He doesn’t have time for that shit. He’s got better, more badass things to get done than laundry. Unless it’s his light colors load. Those he cares more about. One time he left those in too long and they got really wrinkly and you could see it because they’re light colored.
Why doesn’t the Princeton Badass have time to change his laundry promptly? Why does he let it sit for a few days before getting around to it? Why? Here’s fucking why. The Princeton Badass has shit to do. The Princeton Badass is in a frat. A fucking frat. Yeah, he goes to an Ivy League school, but the Princeton Badass consistently goes out one to two times per week. Yup. Every. Single. Week. And a bunch of those times are at T.I. The Princeton Badass has like ten friends at T.I., and he’s basically a member even though he didn’t technically “get in.”
But how can the Princeton Badass do that? How can he take nearly five hours every week away from his studies and still survive at Princeton? Shut the fuck up. Here’s how- he doesn’t give a fuck. The Princeton Badass is ambivalent about his schoolwork relative to the rest of Princeton’s student body. Every Tuesday, he’s one of like two or three kids to skip Econ 100 lecture. He wouldn’t even show up to precept if he didn’t have to turn in his problem sets there. Last semester, he got a fucking “B+” and a “B” and didn’t even email his mom until she specifically asked him how his classes were going. Didn’t give a fuck.
The Princeton Badass has already walked out of the Fitz-Randolph Gates like four times since he was a freshman. He hung out with the cool kids in high school, so he’s never really fit in at Princeton- he probably wouldn’t even be here with all these nerds if his dad wasn’t a graduate. He watches professional sports with his friends while drinking beer- sometimes even on weeknights. He owns lax pinnies. He wears fratty hats that break the style norms of the Ivy League.
If you think you might be a Princeton Badass, you’re thinking too much. You’ll never be a Princeton Badass, you pussy.
The Princeton Hot Girl
But the archetype for the Princeton Badass is unfair! What about girls who wanna be badass!? What about Title 9?! Being a Princeton Badass isn’t a sport, idiot. Although it probably should be, since the Princeton Badass was a really good athlete in high school and was almost good enough to play sports at Princeton.
But still, the questions I pretended you raised are valid ones. The answer is that while a girl can never be the Princeton Badass, there is one persona she can claim for her own, one that non-transsexual males at Princeton can never attain. Yes, I’m referring to the Princeton Badass’s female counterpart- the Princeton Hot Girl.
The Princeton Hot girl is hot. How hot is she? She got accepted into a sorority here- ’nuff said. She was like a 6 in high school but she’s easily a 9 at Princeton- closer to a 10, really. Yeah, she’s a legacy, but that’s not how she got into Princeton. She got in because she had a lot of extra-curriculars and threw down a 1420 verbal-reading score (she messed up on the writing section but that doesn’t really count anyway), which she worked hard to earn with her tutor. It’s actually shocking, and maybe even intimidating, how smart she is, considering how hot she is. She’s got it all.
But the most intimidating thing about the Princeton Hot Girl is how aware of herself she is. She knows you were checking her out in class the other day. You can plead your case that you were looking ahead at the “professor” and his “lecture slides,” and that the girl was simply “in front of you,” but she knows the real reason you were facing forward with your eyes open. What’s really pathetic is that you actually think you have a chance with her. The Princeton Hot Girl is no slut. She doesn’t even do that much with guys when she’s sober. She’s too valuable to just be passed around like that. She goes to Princeton. She’s gonna marry a fucking president or an astronaut one day. Unless you plan on drinking alcohol and being present in T.I., Cottage, or Ivy at some point this year, you don’t come close to meeting her standards. She’s out of your league. She’s the Princeton Hot Girl.
The Princeton Legacy
As everyone knows, the purpose of frats and sororities is to bring legacies of each gender together for intercourse so that they can create the next generation’s legacies.
That being said, the Princeton Badass doesn’t give a shit about girls. But he needs to get his sex on. And again, the Princeton Hot girl is not a slut, but how can she prove she’s hot if she doesn’t get laid?
It’s only a matter of time before the Princeton Badass and the Princeton Hot Girl hook up. They both know they could do better if they looked harder, but the selection at Princeton is thin- it’d be unrealistic to wait around thinking they could find someone as good as themselves.
After college, the Princeton Hot Girl gets knocked up. That’s not really the right term- she’s already married the Princeton Badass. So much for the president or the astronaut, but that would have been shallow anyway; remember- she’s a Princeton Hot Girl, not a Hot Girl. She doesn’t know the sex of the child yet, but that’s not important. All she needs to know is that the child is a Princeton Legacy, destined to assume one of two exalted positions: the Princeton Badass or the Princeton Hot Girl.
-Wolfe