What It Is To Be "Bad"

In “Greasy Lake,” a group of teenagers finds out that they do not have what it takes to be “bad.” This group of teens has “bad” attitudes, looks, characteristics, and interests. They are even convinced they are “bad,” although there is a little thought in their heads saying that they are not living up to the ideal image of themselves. Until this story and this particular night, the badness of these teens has never been put to the test. Once it does get put to the test, it is quite clear that this group of young men is truly not “bad.” People’s true characteristics and personality come out when the going gets hard. The times became tough on this particular night, and the teens appeared anything but “bad.” After the fact that they are not living up to their ideal images dawned on the boys, they refused to even go party with a girl who offered them drugs. I felt that the real personalities and qualities of the boys would come out after this night. No longer would they be “fake” or “posers” anymore; instead, they would be who they really were and not put on some unrealistic image of themselves. They were caught up in trying to impress not only themselves, but also other people including girls and their friends. That is the worst part about what they were doing. These boys just wanted to look “bad” in the eyes of other people. In trying to obtain this goal, they boys just ended up getting into extremely dangerous situations. In these dangerous situations, their attitudes completely changed and did not act “bad” anymore. Instead they ran away. If they were what they pretended to be, they would not have run away and would have stayed to fight. Of course, since these boys were just teenagers, they have a lot of maturing to do still, and this phase of being trying to be “bad,” probably was just a simple phase. By realizing that they were not meant to be “bad,” these teens started on their maturing process. Looking back, when all of these teens have turned into normal adults, they will realize that this night led to the beginning of their maturation process. At the time this night probably seemed to be quite a setback, but truly it was a good thing that it happened. This night served as a wakeup call. If this had not happened, these teens might be adults who are still trying to be “bad,” even though they will never truly be “bad.”