Analyzing the Tantalizing Myth of the Madonna v. Whore Complex in Characters

Sexuality is very fluid and for the most part, there has been a societal shift towards a more “sex-positive” society. I digress because, as always, there is always a part of society that prefers to remain conservative. As a human female, basing my observations of other humans, it has dawned on me that human females are categorized as either: a) a virgin/pure hearted (madonna) or b) a person of questionable morals (whore). Once a person has a reputation of one of the two categories, they are either one-hundred percent madonna or one-hundred percent whore with little gray area in between.

The other night, I was watching the film Legend (1986) starring Mia Sara. In the film, her character, Lili, begins as a pure-hearted maiden who is able to see a unicorn, yet throughout the duration of the film, slowly allows the Darkness to seduce her, so she faces a turning point and embraces the sultry side of life and transforms into a dark-haired vixen. During a scene where a dance between Lili’s light side and Lili’s dark side takes place, I paused the film and realized this film narrated the perfect description of having a conflict between deep, passionate desires while yearning to remain pure and innocent.

In general, women can express both the light/pure side as well as a dark side simultaneously there is no either/or. In Dita von Teese’s book Your Beauty Mark, she writes that, “Beautiful lingerie… is a signal that you love yourself enough to take out the good stuff and feel special even on the most mundane of days.” Von Teese celebrates the idea that a woman can wear lace underneath a beautiful, traditional dress because it is a combination of the light and the dark sides of her personality.

A few summers ago, I attended a burlesque show in Downtown Los Angeles where all the female attendees (evenly distributed mixed male and female audience) were dressed in vintage dresses from the 1950s. The appeal of appearing classy and dignified on the outside with the hidden naughty nature of a burlesque was an intriguing mix and dynamic. At the end of the night, I left with the understanding that it takes an open-mind to realize that people should not be labeled as “madonnas” or “whores”, entirely, but that people exhibit both sides of the coin and it continuously flips throughout the day.




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