Why 'Mad Men' is TV's most feminist show

Washington Post ^ | October 10, 2010 | Stephanie Coontz

[GOP_Party_Animal]

Historians are notorious for savaging historical fiction. We're quick to complain that writers project modern values onto their characters, get the surroundings wrong, cover up the seamy side of an era or exaggerate its evils -- and usually, we're right.

But AMC's hit show "Mad Men," which ends its fourth season next Sunday, is a stunning exception. Every historian I know loves the show; it is, quite simply, one of the most historically accurate television series ever produced. And despite the rampant chauvinism of virtually all its male characters (and some of its female ones), it is also one of the most sympathetic to women.

[GOP_Party_Animal]

I hate this show. One of the reasons why I hate it is not how it reflects how tough the 60's were for women but how the show portrays men.

For example, the article talks about how women had to endure cat calls from men but had no legal recourse to put an end to that boorishness (thank God for lawyers). Maybe I'm wrong, but I like to think such conduct in a professional environment was the exception, not the rule. The show takes the worst elements of male behavior and says, "See how terrible things were in the 60's? It's a good thing we're so enlightened now."

I don't know, there's something in the Hollywood mindset that thinks men have no honor and are only kept in check by strong women or legal action; never by other, better men or their own morality.

[TheThirdRuffian]

I just watch it for the red head.

[samtheman]

In those days there wasn't even a term for sexual harassment, much less any law against it. In North Carolina, only a virgin or a married woman could bring rape charges, and many other states required two witnesses for a rape to be prosecuted. Everywhere, the concept of marital rape would have been laughed out of court. Like the characters in "Mad Men," real-life single women seeking birth control in the early 1960s had difficulty finding a doctor willing to prescribe it. (Indeed, in some states, not even married women were allowed access to birth control.) Most states still had "head and master" laws that gave husbands final say over family decisions, including those concerning joint property.

Sounds like moderate Islam...

...today!

[Irenic]

I usually don’t watch many things on TV other than news— History Channel, Animal Planet...but I love this show and I LOVE Rubicon!

I like how Mad Men shows people drinking, smoking and doing things that have now become taboo and evil.

Set in a time not long ago and look how much freedom has been lost and the brainwashing that has occurred since.

[Responsibility2nd]

I hate this show.

________________________

And I love it. But RE: the article... Pure feminist bullcrap.

RE: the TV show. It’s TV fiction folks. Just as what we see on TV today has little or nothing to do with real life in the 21st century; Mad Men also over dramatizes the good and the bad of the 60’s.

[mancini]

Rubicon is my favorite show! There’s talk out there it was renewed, but I haven’t seen anything official yet. I love every character in that show. Kale Ingram rocks.

[swarthyguy]

>I like how Mad Men shows people drinking, smoking and doing things that have now become taboo and evil

Also rather painful, even when I watch lounge bar scenes in old and not so old movies.

Heck, the boss of our computer department used to buy us young ones pitchers of beer and burgers every other Friday......for lunch even .....unimaginable nowadays.

[Irenic]

I’ve never fretted over a show but I do fret this Sunday being the last.

They sure better renew that thing, I LOVE it!!!

I read they will rerun the old ones Nov (going on recall here)? but I DO want to see that there will be fresh ones coming, it’s GREAT!!!

Awesome, show..awesome! :)

[discostu]

I think both the original writer and you read way too much into it. The fun of the show is NOT that these guys behave in a way that is not acceptable now so we should rejoice in where we are today. The joy of the show is in these guys behaving in a way that is not acceptable now, and gee wouldn’t it be nice to be able to be men again. It’s not “see how terrible things were in the 60s”, it’s “see how AWESOME things were in the 60s, and wouldn’t you like to drink scotch, smoke unfiltered cigarettes and grab that hot chick’s ass while AT WORK”.

[x]

The show takes the worst elements of male behavior and says, "See how terrible things were in the 60's? It's a good thing we're so enlightened now."

Okay. But my suspicion is that you couldn't make the show and have it taken seriously without incorporating some -- or much -- of the feminist critique of the era, just like you couldn't talk about advertising tobacco without taking a negative attitude towards the practice.

Matthew Weiner and Jon Hamm may really love the early 1960s at some deep level, but they have to say (and eventually believe) that the era was in many was deplorable in order to get on the air and be taken seriously (the fact that much of the creative team are feminist women makes this even more certain).

AMC's first original series, Remember WENN, was a sweetly nostalgic look back at 1940s radio. Times were hard but the regular cast meant well and was more or less decent. Hardly anybody watched and the show certainly wasn't a critical favorite.

Is the show really the most accurate television historical drama ever? I don't know. I think it's more that they do make some effort at accuracy, and the era they portray is so different from our own, that the result is bound to be striking. Maybe television sets the bar so low in general that anybody who puts in a minimal attempt to be accurate gets laurels for it.

[j.argese]

Chauvinism rocks!

[Irenic]

Aye, I could go on a rant for days— for all that has become taboo.

It’s really sad.

The damage that some of this fear mongering has caused is breathtaking— it often causes more bad than the good it’s supposed to do.

Pets and private jets are a few...like I said, I could rant for days on the ‘social police’ of all goodness and help. (caugh)

I bet a few beers from the boss on a Fri, at lunch, brought people closer and made work more personal.

[nkycincinnatikid]

mark for wife

[Red in Blue PA]

[MarkL]

I just watch it for the red head.

Yes, Christina Hendricks (I'll always know her a "YoSafBridge") is a favorite of mine, though I've never actually watched the show (Mad Men).

Mark

[Jolla]

doing things that have now become taboo and evil

one of my favorite scenes was when the kid had the plastic wrapping the cleaners put over shirts, suits etc., over their head like a ghost running around, the mom yelled, you better not have thrown those clothes on the floor!

[donna]

Women in the 60’s lied about men to get laws passed. Now we believe the lies are real history. Too sad.

[Constitution Day]

I just watch it for the red head.

Oh yes.

[RegulatorCountry]

The early sixties were the last time anyone could actually say that men were men and women were women as far as society as a whole is concerned. That's the appeal, for both sexes. By the mid-sixties, in urban areas at least, this was no longer true.

There's more genuine sexual allure in one of those so-called repressed women than in all the tramp-stamped, aggressive females on the rest of cable put together. Some things are best left to the imagination, and very little imagination is required these days.

[StormEye]

"Rubicon is my favorite show! There’s talk out there it was renewed, but I haven’t seen anything official yet. I love every character in that show. Kale Ingram rocks."

I've been watching Rubicon also. I like the show but have some problems with it.

• Will Travers needs to learn to be as sneaky as Kale. Working on his "project" in his office at API is just plain stupid and suicidal. The show's writers need to fix that.

And there are other things too. But overall I've enjoyed the series.