In my world you MARRY the nice guy and you date the assholes until you realize you need to grow up and start dating the nice guys cuz its time to start thinking family, future, babies etc.
I started with the asshole bf. then i dated the nice guy. then i dated the asshole. then i fell for the nice guy, we lasted longer than anyone else (at that time). but then we broke up cuz heaven forbid he was the nice guy and hell i wanted a bad boy. so i found a bad boy a year later. he moved and i rebounded with another bad boy. now i'm waiting... to date the nice guy.
my friends and i have had countless discussions about the 'nice guy' and 'bad guy' thing. part of it is we like the chase. we love going after things we can't have. the bad boy symbolizes what we shouldn't have, not so much what we can't. but deep down, we do want to be treated like a princess, we do like the charmers and most importantly we like the nice guy who actually cares about us, likes us for us and so on. the bad boy thing is normally a phase in women, and i feel sorry for those who can't step out of that phase or cycle. cuz in reality there are soo many nice guys out there, the bad guys just blind us with false hope and put the nice guys in a shadow... but one day, we wake up and see into that shadow and realize the guy we SHOULD be with has been there all along...