What makes a badass badass? Is it a motorcycle and leather jacket, à Marlon Brando in The Wild One? Is it sensitive Holden Caulfield's escape from all the phonies in The Catcher in the Rye? Is it the complete opposite of selling J.D. Salinger's toilet on eBay? (We're gonna go with yes on that last one).

Badass is a lot of different things to a lot of different people, so definitions naturally vary. Mostly, badassery isn't just action, it's an attitude. It's a confidence that permeates every action combined with intolerance for bullshit and a certain level of apathy toward things that don't concern the badass. It's Maslow's self actualization by way of The Most Interesting Man in the World.

There is no badass uniform, no secret handshake or easy identifier. Badasses simply are. They're trail blazers without calling too much attention to themselves, so we're here to do it for them. For this, the third anniversary issue of (Cult)ure, we've gathered together badasses from politics and pop culture, so you don't have to. Welcome to the Badass issue.