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Except that it's generally not women who are producing and writing sitcoms--it's actually pretty rare, and when they do (think Mindy Kaling or Tina Fey) their female characters are hugely flawed. So it's male comedy writers who are perpetuating these tired stereotypes.
Exactly, LOL.
Male-dominated sitcom and movie writing has been touting all this stuff literally for more than half a century. So...we're sorry but...we're not sorry. Because well, we didn't do it, LOL.
Movies and TV have deeply damaged human romantic relationships in my opinion. Reason being.. they set up "expectations" and "norms" for relationships. The result is a suppression of people's individuality and a rejection of the different ways a romantic relationship can work.
The more a relationship lives up to the media standard the more successful it is viewed to be. This leads to people comparing their relationships to those of their friends, family, celebs, TV, movies, etc. and finding reasons to be unsatisfied.
There is a reason people are marrying later in life and less often overall.
Because of sitcoms???
Actually, it's because of
1. freedom to seek self-support through work,
2. an expansion of "roles" to that one sex does not literally need a permanent legal union with the other just to clean a shirt or change a tire and
3. seeking education and/or career stability before making incredibly expensive, presumably permanent (or at least costly and traumatic to extricate oneself from) legal commitments.
1. freedom to seek self-support through work,
2. an expansion of "roles" to that one sex does not literally need a permanent legal union with the other just to clean a shirt or change a tire and
3. seeking education and/or career stability before making incredibly expensive, presumably permanent (or at least costly and traumatic to extricate oneself from) legal commitments.
I'd suggest also that people aren't getting married because of the economy. I keep seeing these things on Facebook saying, "Millennials aren't making babies!" followed by "No crap, babies are expensive and we can barely support ourselves."
It's really hard to have a one-earner household, the job of a working Mom is exhausting and not necessarily rewarding (to everyone) and I think plenty of young people are looking at it like, "what exactly do I get out of this again?" You throw in there that women can be on birth control and have sex without even a committed relationship, and tell the world to stow their judgment where the sun don't shine, and hey there is less reason than ever to settle in and become the "lil wifey" to some dude.
But some women definitely want the picket fence experience, and lucky for them, so do plenty of men.
I think it's great that we're more free to choose what we want, whether that's a traditional family unit, or being a free-wheeling single our whole lives, or divorcing a jerk who treats us badly, and being able to make it on our own.
As for the women who divorce and wind up single parents in poverty? Yeah...um, women usually do not choose to alleviate a bit of unhappiness by plunging their kids into hardship. Poor single moms usually come about because:
- Dad left, or wouldn't commit in the first place.
- Dad's in jail.
- Dad was so severely abusive, she didn't feel she had a choice.
- Dad won't work and is more a burden than a benefit to an already tight situation.
I'm better off than most of these women, in my single-mother-hood since leaving my ex...but I still tried to hold it all together until it literally got so desperate I felt that lives were in danger. It's not a choice women make lightly or because of feminism or whatever.
EDIT: Oi, I think I got mixed up between this and the "commitment-phobic" thread LOL! Whatever. It's Friday and I'm 25 minutes from going home. Sue me.
^ Yes...my niece has this situation (i.e. the economy)...she and her intended have been very much in love for six years. They're in their late 20s now. They work but are paying off student loans and there is no way on earth they can set up a household together, so they see eachother all the time but just don't feel they can be married. You really can't be married, living separately in the parents' home.
Regarding TV, funny story, so I hopped onto Facebook to kill a couple of those last 25 minutes of my day here, and came across an article about a Netflix series called "Love"...and lookie, lookie, here's a quote from this article:
"If every fight is easily resolved, if every character is self-aware and good at anticipating their partner's needs, if everyone is self-actualized, present and attentive, well, that's a Hallmark card, not a television show."
- "How the Male Characters In 'Love' Deconstruct the Lie of the Nice Guy" by Tracy Moore, MEL Magazine March 14, 2018
Location: RI, MA, VT, WI, IL, CA, IN (that one sucked), KY
41,937 posts, read 36,951,955 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by JerZ
Because of sitcoms???
Actually, it's because of
1. freedom to seek self-support through work,
2. an expansion of "roles" to that one sex does not literally need a permanent legal union with the other just to clean a shirt or change a tire and
3. seeking education and/or career stability before making incredibly expensive, presumably permanent (or at least costly and traumatic to extricate oneself from) legal commitments.
These are the reasons. The main ones. It has nothing to do with TV.
1. freedom to seek self-support through work,
2. an expansion of "roles" to that one sex does not literally need a permanent legal union with the other just to clean a shirt or change a tire and
3. seeking education and/or career stability before making incredibly expensive, presumably permanent (or at least costly and traumatic to extricate oneself from) legal commitments.
Quote:
Originally Posted by timberline742
These are the reasons. The main ones. It has nothing to do with TV.
Why does it have to be one or the other?
Mass media has definitely had a strong impact on the expectations people have in their lives. You can't be seriously denying that. Are you?
Mass media has definitely had a strong impact on the expectations people have in their lives. You can't be seriously denying that. Are you?
Because no matter how large an "impact" media has on people's lives, it has never ruled them, period. Even in the 50s, few people actually lived a Father Knows Best or Leave it to Beaver life. Even with FIRM and CONSTANT pressure to lead a perfect Dad has a pipe at night, Mom cleans life, people took drugs, drank and cheated to escape that pressure, and even when that was in secret few literally conformed to what "the media" wanted...AND the very instant it was legally feasible to do so, they abandoned their marriages like bats out of hell. Yes, those very people who married in the 50s.
Read "The Way We Never Were." It's interesting.
Media exerts pressure to make people think there's a perfect life, but not everybody has ever tried to follow that, a percentage did try to superficially follow, and a percentage were entirely unable to follow...all throughout history.
We think people did. Based on what? You guessed it. TV, movies, and before that, literature, painting and sculpture.
In other words, imaginings of what a "perfect world" it was, at any given time.
Go ahead and look up the 5 most popular TV series right this minute, and the top 5 non-fantasy movies. Tell me whether they're realistic to anyone you personally know. Not in general (i.e. "The Big Bang Theory," hey, I know an autistic person too!) but in the actual show, the weekly episodes. What happens to people. The "crazy" situations they get into. The amazingly hot girl they know. Their incredible brilliance. Or whatever. It's unlikely you can watch any top-rated show and decide it's representative of what most people want to live like or expect to live like. Why do you think even reality TV isn't that "real"? Because we don't want reality out of our shows, that's the whole point.
Even the sitcoms of the days of yore were more to comfort people and take them away from their difficult lives than to realistically make them relate except in the well-timed blurbs or laughs that paralleled real life in order to keep the watchers hooked in thinking they were loosely relevant. In fact that's been the cycle of sitcoms since the dawn of them.
I'd suggest also that people aren't getting married because of the economy. I keep seeing these things on Facebook saying, "Millennials aren't making babies!" followed by "No crap, babies are expensive and we can barely support ourselves."
I think finances/economy is the number one reason for delay of marriage.
As for the comment on TV/movies being harmful, I'd think social media/internet is more damaging. Comparing how others live thru Facebook/Instagram/Twitter/Whateverispopular is not good.
I dislike wasting money on something impractical and frivolous. Flowers are generally stupid. They wilt away and are promptly forgotten, plus they jack up the prices on VD. Last time I got some I found a more practical solution - no jacked up prices, they did not wilt and were useful for more than just looking at them for a few hours, no waiting in line to buy them and they made my wife happy. This solution made me hate VD a little less.
I am with you there. I've known florists. They make a killing on Valentine's Day. One guy would not bring roses home for his wife on VD because he just couldn't stand looking at them anymore. A week or so later, they would go to the city for dinner and a Broadway play instead. Nice deal.
I would rather wait till spring and get something with roots to plant than get cut flowers.
Last edited by Mightyqueen801; 03-31-2018 at 06:36 AM..
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Because well, we didn't do it, LOL.
